Night of the Cursed
by A-LionGleek
Summary: The titans have finally returned from Tokyo, but before long they end up at work once again to foil the newest plot cooked up by their arch nemesis, Slade, and his new compatriot Vandal Savage. And to make matters worse, if they don't stop this plot, then there will literally be Hell to pay! Rated T to be safe.
1. Prologue

**Hello people of the fanfiction world! I hope you're all ready for a seriously big dose of awesomeness, because here is the beginning of my very first multi-chapter Teen Titans story! As of this moment, I very much hope you guys read, review, and enjoy (but definitely leave a healthy batch of reviews)! Without further ado, I give you the prologue of the epic 6th season premiere of Teen Titans, A-LionGleek style.**

**A/N: While it would be awesome, I do not own Teen Titans or any other elements of the DC Universe that might be recognized as not mine. Also, for anyone who might take religious offense at certain events that unfold in this chapter, I apologize in advance.**

**And now, let us begin!**

**Prologue:**

It was a beautiful morning in Tokyo. The sun had long since risen, and was now hovering miles over the ocean as it continued to rise ever higher into the sky on its daily journey. It was 8:00, but already the people of the great Japanese city were beginning to get started on their daily business. All in all, things seemed perfectly normal within the city.

However, on a mountain not too far outside the city's borders, someone not quite so ordinary was standing nearby the edge of a cliff, watching the sun. And as this person in question stood there at the edge of the small cliff, watching the sun slowly continue its daily climb higher and higher into the sky, he couldn't help but let a small smile cross his serious toned face. Already, he had a feeling that today would be a very beautiful day in Tokyo, just like the past few days.

The individual, a young boy who looked to be around 17 or so years old, was standing near enough to the edge to truly appreciate the view, but far enough to avoid running the risk of slipping over the edge and falling off, had his hands on his hips, and had his face directed very carefully upwards towards the slowly ascending sun. Admittedly, being outside the city at this particular location all alone had the potential to develop into a very dangerous situation in this world. Fortunately, this boy was used to potential danger, and one needed only to get a good enough look at him to tell that he looked the part for someone capable of facing danger.

For starters, this teenage boy was very physically fit. Admittedly, while he didn't have the extremely bulky and musclebound body that could often be found in body builders, football players, and the like, he was still athletic in a more slender and flexible build that would be perfect for a dancer or acrobat. In fact, this same bodily build had not only proven very useful in the life he'd led before donning his new common identity, but had also been invaluable for the fighting style he'd later developed and mastered; a fighting style that had proved to be enough for him to take on beings and creatures far bigger and stronger than him on equal footing at the very least.

His physical appearance also hinted at how capable he was of fighting off a credible threat to his safety. As was sensible for a person such as him, his outfit exposed very little of his naturally fair skin that made him easily stand out as a foreigner among the darker skinned natives of Japan. His outfit, while worthy of laughter among some individuals, was also something that had come to be very widely associated with him. He wore green tight-like pants as well as black ankle-high steel-toed and steel-rimmed boots. He also wore green gloves that reached up to his elbows and a green short-sleeve t-shirt that was almost always covered up with a resplendent red armored vest with three short horizontal yellow stripes lining down the chest area and a small circular black badge with a yellow uppercase "R" on it located over his left pectoral muscle. Around his waist, was a bright yellow utility belt that contained all manner of ingenious gadgets and reliable weapons; and his eyes were covered up by a black and white domino mask. Even the jet black cape with a yellow interior that was attached to the back collar of his vest was proof of how he was more than capable of holding his own in the dangerous world he lived in. While at first glance, it looked no different from any ordinary cloth cape, it was actually made from a highly durable and sturdy polymerized form of titanium. This had allowed for him to use it as an effective shield against several forms of blast-type attacks, including flames and lasers. Even his hair looked like the kind of style that could be seen in a real teenage warrior. He had glossy black hair that was gelled up in backward wave-shaped spikes. If this outfit and bodily appearance had been on just an ordinary run-of-the-mill teenager, then the teenager would likely have been in big trouble if someone who had negative connotations associated with the appearance encountered them. Fortunately though, this teenage boy was no ordinary teenager.

Who was this person, you might ask? Well, the answer is a little complicated. Why? Well this person, had two identities, one of them an ordinary civilian name that he was born with, and the second a name that he was more commonly known by nowadays ever since very early on in his life that had become very comfortable to him and had become a major name among both households and the world of crime fighting that he was a part of. In fact, very few people at all knew of his birth name that he now kept such a closely guarded secret. Not even his four closest friends that had come to be viewed by him as a family were aware of his true civilian name. However, he very much planned now to make sure to change that before his dying day. The way he'd now seen it for a long time, if anyone deserved to know the name his parents had given him, not to mention hear it come out of his own mouth, it was them. They had more than earned it in his mask covered eyes. However, the name that they currently knew him by, and the name that he was known as by every civilian, hero, and even villain that knew him, was Robin.

Robin smiled, clasped his hands together, and stretched them over his head. He let out a relieved sigh as he felt the effects of his stretching. "Yep," he thought to himself. "Today's definitely going to be an amazing day."

At that moment, Robin heard a yawn coming from not too far behind him, and a voice then say, "Morning Robin. Enjoying the view?"

Robin smiled, turned his head to look behind him, and said, "Sure thing Cy."

Upon hearing this, Cyborg smiled, his blue-gray human eye and bright red cybernetic eye alight with happiness, and the hard sturdy metal that made up the majority of his body dazzling in the light of the sun. "Good to know," he said. The half-robot teenager turned his gaze to face the sun, and then said, "Certainly does look like a good day for us to go home."

Robin chuckled, rammed his right fist into his open left palm, and said, "I hear you man."

This day, as Cyborg had said, was indeed the day that the Teen Titans would finally be ending their now week-long vacation in Tokyo and returning to their home in Jump City, California. Admittedly, Robin had to admit that despite his original reluctance to stay in Tokyo longer than necessary for the mission they'd originally come to complete, even he had ended up very much feeling like his eventual decision for the Titans to have a vacation there for a few more days had proven worthwhile. Over the course of the past few days, he and the other titans had had quite a lot of fun. At least, he was pretty sure they'd all had lots of fun; though with Raven, you could never really tell. But now, having spent an entire week in Tokyo, Robin felt it was high time for the titans to end their vacation and return home.

Cyborg eventually nodded to himself, and said to Robin, "Well I don't know about you man, but I'm going to head back to the T-Ship. I'm sure the others are already there waiting for the goodbye wagon; especially your _girlfriend_."

Robin stiffened, and then shook his head side to side with an annoyed glare on his face. "Shut up," he groaned as the 19 year old cybernetic African American boy laughed and started walking in the direction opposite from the edge of the cliff. But even under his stern glare, Robin felt his heart flutter and a small smile fighting to come onto his face. His 'girlfriend' as Cyborg put it, and as he himself had to admit was an accurate way to describe it now, was Starfire.

His smile finally achieved victory in its struggle to appear as he thought of the beautiful Tamaranean girl who'd come to mean so much to him now over the course of the five years he'd known her. He chuckled as he thought of how very likely it was that Batman had almost certainly discovered his former protégé's current relationship status with Starfire due to his almost constantly keeping 'secret' tabs on him as well as keeping track of all the criminal activity he monitored. He already had a feeling that when Batman inevitably sent him a message or came to visit over this matter, his former mentor would be pissed off at him for 'stooping so low as to break the rules about romantic relationships with team members a second time, and this time successfully.' But at that moment, Robin didn't care. He knew what love was, and he knew, for a fact, that he loved Starfire. What he felt for her was much stronger then what he'd once thought he felt for Barbara Gordon during his time under Batman's wing. Chuckling at the memory, he thought, "Yep, I am definitely in love with Starfire."

He then turned his head to face the path that led away from the cliff edge he was currently standing by and towards where the T-Ship was parked, and grinned as he thought, "And Cyborg does have a point; I'd better not keep Starfire waiting." Smiling as he had that thought, Robin turned away from the cliff edge and confidently started walking down the path towards the ship.

. . . . .

At 9:00 sharp, Robin and the other Titans were at the location where the T-Ship was parked together, and so was a vast crowd of Tokyo citizens come to wish them a happy farewell. Among the crowd were almost every citizen of Tokyo who had come to view the Teen Titans as heroes of Japan. And of course, examples of the people who'd come to see them off were the chefs that Cyborg had at first ignited the ire of but later earned the favor of, the considerable number of fan-girls that Beast Boy had attracted, the bookstore owner Raven had met and had proven incidentally very valuable in the titans finding out the full story of Brushogun, and of course the major of Tokyo.

At this particular moment, the mayor of Tokyo was feeling very happy indeed as he stood before Robin. The mayor had to admit that the five teenage foreigners had proven to be amazing guests in his city after their names had cleared upon the defeat of Uehara Daizo, the former commander of the now disbanded Tokyo Troopers. Needless to say, the mayor now couldn't have felt more honored to have had the Teen Titans as Tokyo's guests.

Smiling, the mayor eventually reached out his hand towards Robin. The boy wonder smiled, and proceeded to grasp onto the mayor's hand in a companionable handshake. Upon finishing their handshake, the two let go of their hands. The mayor then said, "It was truly an honor for you to spend the past week in my fair city."

"Thanks," said Robin. "It was my pleasure, and that of my team."

The mayor chuckled. "Indeed," he said. "It is a real pity that you must now leave."

Robin nodded, a sympathetic look on his face, and responded, "I understand sir; and trust me, me and the other Titans don't mean any offense. The time we've spent here over the past week has been amazing, and we don't hold anything against you or your city; but as you and your people view Tokyo as your home, we have another place outside Tokyo that we view as our home. And at this point, we really need to return, because we miss our home, and just as Tokyo needed us last week, our home still needs us even now. And it just wouldn't be honorable for us to abandon our home in its time of need."

The mayor smiled, placed his hand on Robin's shoulder, and then stated, "Indeed it would not. Therefore, I wish you and your friends the best of luck and the most pleasant of journeys home. And all of us in Tokyo wish you great happiness outside our fair city. But know this; if ever in the future you decide to come back, know that you and your team will always be welcome here in Tokyo."

Robin smiled. "I couldn't have it any other way," he responded.

Meanwhile, closer to the T-Ship, Cyborg was watching intently. "Boy he definitely knows his way around the world of diplomacy," he thought to himself with a smile. "Heck, if I didn't know any better, I'd swear he was raised by Bruce Wayne himself."

A couple feet or so away from Cyborg, a pale gray skinned 16 year old girl with violet purple eyes, dark lilac purple hair, and dressed in a jet black long-sleeved leotard stood nearby one of the wings of the T-Ship, her arms folded across her chest, her hooded dark blue cloak blowing in the wind, and her face as emotionlessly grim and taciturn as ever. Not even the small bits of sunlight that shined down on the rubies on her belt, gloves, and necklace were enough to sufficiently brighten up the rather dark air around her.

Raven had not entirely had quite the same amount of fun on this trip as her four companions. In fact, out of all of them, she was the one who had enjoyed their karaoke night they'd had at one point during the week the least. Sending an emotionless glare towards Robin as she watched him talk with the mayor, she let out a small sigh, turned her head away, and thought to herself, "Just hurry up and say goodbye already."

Unlike her team mates, Raven hadn't made very many friends over the course of the week-long vacation. Practically the only friend she had made among the Tokyo natives was the bookstore owner. A small smile that didn't reach her eyes came on her mouth as she remembered how her already massive collection of books had grown considerably over the course of the past week thanks to her numerous visits to the bookstore. Still, apart from that, she wasn't all that eager to delay departure from Tokyo to return home any longer than necessary.

She turned her head to face the direction where Robin was, and found her glare returning as she saw that he was still deep in conversation with the mayor. "Hurry up," she thought to herself irritably.

At that moment, she heard a relatively higher pitched male voice from a few feet or so to her right yell, "Dude! Put that away! I already signed that three times! Can't you count?!"

She turned her head to look to her right. Sure enough, standing not too far away in that direction directly in front of a large crowd of screaming Japanese teenage girls was a 17 year old teenage boy dressed in a purple and black jump suit, gray gloves, and a pair of sneakers that had the same color as his jump suit complete with gray bottoms that had paw print designs on them. And even if she hadn't been familiar with his outfit, she would have still recognized him from 50 miles away with his iconic green skin, eyes, and hair; not to mention his pointy elf-like ears and rather sharp fang-like teeth. As she watched, the green boy directed an irritated glare at the ocean of girls standing before him thrusting autograph books, hands, and all manner of other things at him and screaming joyously like a pack of hyperactive first graders, and said, "Dude! Stop that! I'm trying to say goodbye here! Quit it! For the love of . . . enough already!"

Raven sighed as she watched the green boy have a hard time with the overexcited fan girls. Earlier the previous day, the boy in question had insisted that he be given a chance to say goodbye to his immense crowd of fan girls. Now, judging from his current voice tone and actions, he was beginning to seriously regret this decision. "Beast Boy," she thought to herself, "I'm surprised you didn't get this annoyed by them days ago." And indeed she was. She never could really understand how Beast Boy could possibly tolerate spending so much of his valuable free time in the considerably large company of all those ditzy and air headed foreign girls who seemed to mindlessly worship him as an angel from Heaven. "As if an angel would look like that," she thought to herself. While she had admittedly never encountered an actual angel before, she had a feeling that neither a real angel, nor the ones described in the Bible would look anything like Beast Boy.

Then Raven unconsciously found herself looking at Beast Boy again. In particular, she found herself focusing on his hair. She wasn't sure if anyone else, or even Beast Boy himself had noticed, but she had seen that over the course of the days that had followed Daizo's defeat, his dark green hair had started to show signs of turning lighter in color, to the point that his hair now looked more like a chartreuse blonde that artfully contrasted with his more lime green skin and emerald toned eyes. She then thought to herself in confusion. Since when did she pay so much attention to his physical features? She tried to shake her mind clear of these thoughts, but then she remembered how she'd often at some times made note of his fang-like teeth, taken the odd glance at his elf-like ears that he'd claimed 'chicks dug,' and once even briefly glanced at his hands on the night they'd arrived at Tokyo before he'd put his gloves back on and could have sworn that she saw what looked like small claws in the areas where his finger nails should have been located.

She shook her head violently to clear her head of these thoughts. "It's nothing," she thought to herself emphatically. But even at that moment she wasn't entirely certain as to the truth of her own words. To put it simply, her relationship with the green shape shifter was complicated. They spent most of the time arguing and getting on each other's nerves. Still, Beast Boy had also proven a very good and caring friend to her more than once. That being said, she still had no idea for certain about the odd feelings she sometimes got when around him that weren't annoyance or of a similar nature to annoyance. But she wasn't entirely willing to dig any deeper than necessary in that regard. She was accustomed to repressing her emotions after all.

Meanwhile, to Cyborg's left, looking intently at Robin as she hovered slightly over the ground, was an orange skinned 16 year old girl dressed in a violet purple crop-top, mini-skirt, and boots, as well as a silver neckband, belt, and gauntlets with emerald green jewels on them. She smiled as she watched the dark haired, fair skinned, and traffic light style costume adorned teenage boy talking with the political leader of Tokyo, her vivid green eyes alight with joy, and her long red hair blowing around in the wind as it dangled down past her shoulders.

Starfire couldn't have felt happier at this moment. Ever since she and Robin had finally had their first real kiss, admitted their painfully obvious feelings to each other, and become a couple, the past week couldn't have been more joyous for her. And now, she was very much looking forward to going home and spreading word of the news to her friends that hadn't accompanied her, Robin, and the others to Tokyo. Of course, she was also greatly feeling happy at the chance to finally reunite with her beloved pet mutant moth larva Silkie, peacefully relax in her own bedroom, and spend joyous time with her friends, especially her boyfriend Robin.

Eventually, Beast Boy noticed out of the corner of his eyes that Robin appeared to be winding down on his chat with the mayor, and he realized that it was now time for him to get away from his fan girls. Thinking quickly, he abruptly pointed his finger at the empty space behind them all and yelled, "Look behind you!"

Miraculously enough, they all fell for it, and they turned their heads as one to look behind them. At that moment, while the entire herd of fan girls was looking away, Beast Boy turned around and bolted over to take a position in between Cyborg and Raven. As Beast Boy stood there afterward panting in exhaustion, Cyborg chuckled at his green friend and said, "Boy you sure look happy to go."

Beast Boy glared at the cybernetic teenager and said, "Put a sock in it Cyborg."

Raven felt a small smirk come up on her mouth as she heard this. "Better late than never," she thought to herself.

Seconds later, Robin parted ways with the mayor after giving a final handshake and took his place in between Cyborg and Starfire, very unsubtly grabbing onto Starfire's right hand with his own left hand. Starfire smiled, a deep blush on her face as she closed her eyes at the contact.

With all the titans now positioned at the T-Ship, the mayor turned to face the assembled crowd and yelled, "People of Tokyo! Let us all wish a happy farewell to our honored guests and Tokyo's newest heroes, the Teen Titans!" The crowd went wild with cheering. Even Beast Boy's fan girls, much to his surprise and wariness, seemed as happy as ever as they cheered, seemingly not phased all that much by his abruptly leaving them hanging earlier.

As the cheering started showing signs of winding down, Robin winked at Cyborg, and the partially robotic teenager smiled before pressing a switch that caused the glass windows/hatches of the ship's seating compartments to open up at the ready for their occupants of the journey to climb aboard.

With this out of the way, Robin proceeded to smile at the crowd, readjust his mask, and give a slight wave before proceeding to climb up into the compartment located all the way at the very front end of the ship, dutifully pressing the button that would reseal the hatch upon taking his seat. Raven wasted no time at all, promptly disappearing in a flash of shadows and then reappearing inside the compartment located on the right wing of the ship. The hatch for her compartment closed seconds later. Cyborg yelled a "Booyah," and then proceeded to walk slowly over to the tail end of the ship before clambering into the compartment located there. He closed the hatch of his compartment soon afterwards. Starfire then proceeded to fly over to the compartment on the left wing of the ship. No sooner had Starfire so much as started flying over to her compartment, when Beast Boy quickly turned to face the T-Ship and began to climb up towards the compartment in the very center of the ship.

Unfortunately for Beast Boy, it seemed as if he'd only just lifted up his right foot after clenching onto the rim of the compartment with his hands when he felt a large multitude of hands grab onto his legs and feet and start to pull on them as if something were trying to pull him away.

Beast Boy groaned upon feeling this sensation, for he had a feeling that he should have expected for this to happen. He turned his head to look behind him, and found himself glaring with irritation when he found that he had indeed been grabbed onto by his fan girls. "Dude!" He shouted. "I'm trying to leave here!" The fan girls only screamed all the louder and started tugging on his legs even harder.

Raven groaned as she watched this. "Not again," she thought to herself. Robin also groaned mentally as he saw all this unfolding. Starfire, meanwhile, could only glance fearfully from within her safely sealed compartment as she watched her green friend struggle vigorously to break free from the grasp of his over eager Tokyo fan girls.

Cyborg, meanwhile, whistled as he watched all this occur. "Dang BB," he said out loud, "those girls must really want you bad!"

"Dude!" Beast Boy yelled. "Empathy man! Empathy!"

Of course, the fan girls only continued to pull on Beast Boy, who tried furiously to break himself free and wrench himself out of their grip and into his chosen compartment of the T-Ship.

"Good grief," he growled. "Enough with this already! I'm serious! You've already had your chance to say goodbye, and you blew it! For Pete's sake! Let go!" He shouted the last bit as he proceeded to turn his head, lift up his right hand and slap one girl's hand off of him in irritation.

Unfortunately, this action didn't seem to help at all, for even more girls than grabbed onto his legs, and all the girls redoubled their efforts to pull him away from the ship. Beast Boy shrieked in surprise and annoyance as he proceeded to have his right hand grab back onto the ship again and he resumed his efforts to wrench himself free.

After a few minutes of this struggling, Beast Boy gritted his teeth, closed his eyes, and directed his head upwards towards the sky before yelling, "Let go!"

Seconds after he yelled this, he opened his eyes, growled, and proceeded to morph into a smilodon. Upon transforming into the iconic prehistoric cat commonly known as the saber toothed tiger, he dug his front claws and his two massive canine teeth into the exterior of the ship, trying desperately to give himself a hold on the ship that he could use to tug himself free from his unyielding fan girls and escape into the safety of the T-Ship compartment so he and his friends could go home.

Unfortunately, the girls, miraculously undeterred by the presence of the ferocious prehistoric beast they now held by the hindlegs in the place of the teenage boy they'd been struggling with earlier, continued to pull on Beast Boy. In fact, after a few minutes, their efforts were enough to cause Beast Boy to get slowly dragged a slight bit further away from the compartment, his claws and teeth sliding roughly across the exterior of the ship with an irritating whine and leaving small gashes on the exterior.

"You're messing up the paint job!" Cyborg yelled as he saw the damage that Beast Boy's fangs and claws had now left on his precious T-Ship.

Robin turned his head to look at Cyborg with an incredulous look on his face that not even his mask could hide. "You're worried about the paint job!?" Robin yelled in an almost scandalized tone.

Starfire gulped as she continued to watch her now very furry green friend continue to struggle furiously to escape from his very unhelpful fan girls, and then looked at Cyborg before saying, "I agree with Robin. I'd be more worried about friend Beast Boy then this job of paint of which you speak."

"Wouldn't we all," Raven stated in agreement, and of course in her typical monotone. Eventually, she then decided that this travesty had gone on long enough, and she snapped her fingers. In a flash, the fan girls squeaked as their hands were suddenly engulfed in what looked like tendrils of black lightning and they felt a small electric shock pass through their hands.

This intervention from Raven was enough to cause all the girls to let of Beast Boy's hindlegs and fall backward onto the ground as one. Exactly one second after his hindlegs were finally freed, Beast Boy pressed his hind paws on the side of the ship, removed the tips of his fangs and front claws from the side of the ship, and leaped into his compartment. No sooner had he landed safely within the compartment when he morphed back to human form, sat down firmly on his seat, and punched the button that would close the hatch to his compartment. The hatch couldn't have closed and locked itself more quickly afterward in his opinion, and he let out a sigh of relief as he heard the sound of it locking, effectively sealing him off from his off the rocker fan girls.

Smiling in relief, he turned his head to face Raven, who he knew had definitely caused the girls to let go of him, and gave her a thumbs up with a toothy grin on his face. "Thanks Rae," he said. "I owe you one."

"It's _Raven_," said Raven. "And you're welcome."

Beast Boy shook his head side to side nonchalantly, not too rankled this time by Raven's usual put down to the nickname he'd lately taken to calling her over the course of the vacation. At this point, he was too relieved by how he was finally free from the grasp of his fan girls and happy that Raven had at least accepted his thanks to be all that unhappy.

But then all Hell broke loose when the titans felt the ship start to shake as something heavy pressed up against the side of it. The fan girls, now even more driven than ever to get more time with Beast Boy were now pressing up against the side of the ship and willing to topple it over.

Beast Boy groaned at this development to the situation. "Seriously?!" he yelled out loud to no one in particular. "Find a local boy already!"

"Man," said Cyborg. "You sure have crappy taste in girls."

"If it weren't for the fact that this reinforced wall of glass is the only thing keeping me safe from all these locos, then you'd be so dead now," said Beast Boy.

Starfire squeaked in fright as she felt the ship list over towards the side. Raven groaned, rolled her eyes, and thought bitterly that their departure was now being even further delayed. Robin shook his head side to side, sighed, and thought to himself, "Heroes and villains I get. Civilians are crazy."

Fortunately for the titans, the mayor had the local police intervene, and before long, the overeager crowd of fan girls was driven back as the police proceeded to force themselves between the girls and the T-Ship, their shields drawn and positioned together in a wall, and push the girls back by moving forward and yelling for them to back off.

The mayor made a sheepish smile towards the titans after the girls had been forced back to a sufficient distance, and said, "Sorry about that."

"It's fine," said Robin, just barely remaining calm. He then turned on his microphone and said, "Alright team, prepare for take-off. It's time to go home." The other titans eagerly agreed, and after the necessary preparations were made and coordinates entered in, they proceeded to cause the T-Ship to take off and start flying off into the horizon as it began its journey back to Jump City.

The people of Tokyo smiled as they watched the ship flying away. They hoped very much that the enjoyable young heroes who'd blessed the city with their presence for the last week would return someday. And of course, all the fan girls howled as one in despair behind the unyielding wall of police officers and police shields barring them out of the area.

However, there was one person in the area who was making barely any noise at all. In fact, she wasn't even among the crowd itself, but was hiding within a small patch of forest nearby as she intently watched the T-Ship flying off to the east towards where she knew it would eventually arrive at Jump City.

Her dark eyes narrowed, and a frown settled on her face beneath the grinning pink and white cat-like mask she wore. Making a small hiss, she rubbed her gloved fingers through her long black braid, and then whispered to herself, "This could put a wrench in the boss's plans." With that note made, she proceeded to quickly duck further into the forest and then silently make her way deeper into the woods. She had a feeling that she'd need to inform her boss about what she'd just witnessed, and she did not want to make it so close to the current Tokyo law enforcement. Considering the news she currently needed to inform her master of, the last thing she could afford was to end up in a Japanese jail, or any kind of jail period.

. . . . .

In another forest located near the coastal regions of California, a lone figure stalked through the dark woods in the night. Any ordinary camper or amateur would have made quite a lot of noise, but this man was trained to move silently. And move silently he did; he moved so carefully and meticulously that not a twig snapped under his feet. In fact, even in spite of the fact that his boots were made out of metal, one could barely hear the sound of his feet touching the ground.

As the lone figure continued to carefully make his way through the forest, he thought carefully to himself about the reason he was currently in this forest this late in the evening. "Whatever he's got to show me," he thought to himself, "it had better be worth my time."

The reason he was currently thinking this was because of how, the last time he'd met up with the partner he was about to visit, the end results had not proven satisfactory for the lone figure that was now wandering through the woods. For nearly a year now, the two had been in a partnership of convenience that came as a result of a more or less common goal. However, the man currently making his way deeper into the forest was still not entirely pleased at the relative lack of progress that had been made in the current objectives. He had expected for much more progress to have been made by now. Fortunately, he was patient; but even his patience could only last so long. "If he hasn't made a useful amount of progress tonight, then our deal is over," he thought to himself.

After what seemed like an hour to the figure trekking through the forest, he eventually caught sight of what appeared to be the light of a fire within a large clearing. Due to how bright the light was, the fire must have been considerably large. The man came up just close enough to just barely be at the border of the clearing illuminated by the light of the fire. He looked within the clearing, and sure enough, he saw another man standing nearby the large flames in the center of the clearing. This man, who looked much bulkier and more muscular than the man watching him, had his back facing the man who'd just arrived, and was looking directly at the fire intently, his long hair waving around in the slight wind.

After a few minutes, the man watching heard the long haired man by the flames sigh, and say without even turning his head, "I know you've arrived. Come on out of the forest and we can talk."

The man who'd been watching from outside the clearing stepped out into the clearing. In the light of the fire, the man in question was now revealed to be wearing a dark gray and black armored suit complete with armored boots and gloves. He was even wearing a two-toned armor plated mask. The right side of his mask was a dark black, and had no eye hole on it. The left side of his face, in stark contrast, was bright orange and had an eye hole. The eye that was revealed by this single eye hole was a dark black and had an unhappy look in it.

Soon after this, the long haired man turned his head, a small smirk on his hideously scarred face as he saw that his current partner in crime had arrived. "It is very good to see that you have finally arrived Deathstroke," said the long haired man.

The armored man groaned, and then said, "I've already told you Savage; I stopped using that name years ago. I now go solely by my first name."

The other man, named Vandal Savage, chuckled, and then said, "Very well then Slade, I will respect that wish. Once again though, I am pleased to see that you have arrived. Now we can discuss our current business again."

Slade sighed, raised his finger, and said, "I'm telling you this now Savage, whatever you called me here for tonight had better be worth my time. And even if it is, you'd better stick to your part of the bargain. The last time I had a partnership with another villain, it didn't end well. If this doesn't turn out any better, then I very much believe it would take me a miracle for me to ever consider forming a partnership a third time."

Vandal Savage smirked, waved his hand dismissively, and said, "Oh don't you worry Slade; you won't have any reason to feel disappointed this time."

"I'd better not," said Slade as he pointed at Savage. "Trust me; if you welch on me, then you're on your own, and I will be getting back to work on tasks that will be far more worthy of my time than your fool's quest."

"And I will be happy to let you get to those tasks," said Savage coolly, seemingly disregarding the insult in Slade's last words.

Savage turned to face the fire, smiled as he thought of the momentous task he was about to make his third and hopefully final attempt at making. He reached into one of the pockets of his heavy cloak and drew out what appeared to be an envelope.

Slade's eye narrowed at the sight of this. "A letter?" Slade asked. "How is that supposed to help us in your little experiment?"

Savage chuckled, waved the envelope around in his hands, and said, "Oh trust me, what's contained in this envelope is no letter. The stuff inside this letter will be guaranteed to allow this ritual to succeed as long as I do it correctly."

"And how would you know this?" Slade asked. "Have you tested it out already?"

"No," Savage admitted. "I'm not about to waste this valuable stuff on minor summons and Infernal chats. No, I needed to save this for the main event. But this time I know it will work. I do have my sources after all who have told me so."

"And who's to say that these sources will be any more trustworthy than the last ones you turned to?"

"The last two sources I used were humans," said Savage. "And ordinary mortal civilians at that. The source I turned to this time was a bit more . . . well, knowledgeable to say the least about the current subject matter." Savage turned his head to face the large bonfire once more. "But enough idle chatter, I have a ritual to attend to."

Upon saying this, Savage drew out a large knife, slit open the letter, and proceeded to pour out the contents, which appeared to be blood red sand into his outstretched right hand. Slade's one good eye narrowed in suspicion at the sight of the sandy substance, but wisely didn't ask any questions.

Savage hovered his hand above the large blaze, spoke a phrase in what appeared to be Latin, and then tossed the sand into the fire. With a flash of red light and a loud banging noise, a plume of unnaturally crimson smoke began to rise from the fire. Before long, the entire massive expanse of contained flames turned ruby red to match the color of the sand that had been tossed into it. The smoke faded away after this.

Savage smirked at the sight, for it seemed that this time his plan would work, and he proceeded to raise his hands up into the air and start chanting in Latin. As Slade listened to Savage's chanting, he found himself silently whistling under his mask. He was well versed in Latin himself, and if the words Savage was currently chanting truly meant what Slade thought they meant, then Savage was truly taking part in some serious work. As Savage continued to chant, the blood red flames seemed to writhe and merge upon each other. Eventually, they seemed to rise up in a large pillar before eventually moving around in a way that allowed them to converge together and form a hovering swirling vortex of red flames with a dark black interior.

Savage stopped chanting, and turned his head to face Slade. Slade raised his eyebrow in an apparent 'you've got a point?' look. But secretly, Slade was impressed. It seemed that this time his partner had indeed gotten it right. Savage chuckled, turned to face the ominous black interior of the hovering vortex of flames, and said, "Greetings your Malevolence. I presume you are prepared to speak?"

Seconds after Savage said this, what appeared to be seven pairs of blood red reptilian eyes with black slit-like pupils appeared within the ominous black background within the vortex. For an ominous few seconds, the eyes stared menacingly at Savage. After what seemed like an eternity, the eyes softened slightly and moved up and down as if whatever creature they belonged to was nodding its head or heads up and down in a gesture of 'yes.' "Indeed I am," said a seemingly timeless yet ancient voice that appeared to come from the center of the portal, where coincidentally the most human-like of the seven pairs of reptilian eyes was located. "Though I must say that it certainly took you long enough to finally come through to me with your attempts at calling."

"My apologies," said Savage. "My first two attempts failed. Apparently, not as many beings are as knowledgeable about this delicate subject matter as I originally thought. I had to find this out the hard way by wasting my time with two human informants."

The sound of snarling came from within the vortex. It sounded very much as if seven ferocious beasts were snarling. "Humans," the voice from within the vortex said in a tone that oozed with derision. "Of course they wouldn't have known the proper way to contact me anymore. The only history they have in these matters these days is summoning, chatting with, and making deals with my _underlings_. Did you really think they would have even the slightest inkling anymore of how to initiate contact with _me_?"

Savage bowed his head, and responded calmly, "Forgive me. I had not truly realized just how vastly human knowledge of these matters had diminished. Apparently, in all the years that have followed the last time a mortal human made a deal with you yourself as opposed to one of your underlings, all mortal humans on Earth have since forgotten the correct way to initiate contact with you. I learned this the hard way in dealing with those two human informants, and ended up having to turn to one of your own underlings for guidance."

"And this underling of mine proved more reliable did it not?"

"It indeed did. It knew how the proper way to communicate with you from outside of your home was with sand from the Judaean Desert soaked in the blood of seven of your underlings that is then tossed into a mighty blaze."

"Exactly," said the voice from within the vortex in a tone that shined with pride.

"Also," said Savage. "I would have contacted you a few minutes or so ago, but A: I wanted my compatriot to be present for this, and B: I received a message from an employee of mine named Cheshire; and on that note, she has recently informed me in this message of an element that could potentially place a wrench in the works of your current plans."

Seven of the eyes in the vortex moved upward as if the being they belonged to was raising it's eyebrows, and then the voice said, "Oh really? And what might this earth-shaking news be?" Slade also looked at Savage with his eyebrow raised. Savage had not informed him of that last detail.

Savage bowed his head, looked back up to face the fourteen eyes looking at him from the other side of the vortex, and responded, "You are familiar with the Teen Titans I presume?"

"You mean that team of prepubescent do-gooders who practically serve as a teenage version of the Justice League, whose five founding members that live in this local area are currently vacationing in Tokyo?" The voice asked. Savage nodded. "Why do you ask?"

"According to Cheshire," said Savage. "They started on their way home from Tokyo about half an hour ago, and they should be home at around noon tomorrow morning in the local time of this area. Cheshire appeared to have reason to believe that this unexpected element from my perspective might prove an unexpected obstacle to your plan."

The being on the other side of the vortex appeared to think to itself, then it appeared to shrug before responding, "I will admit, this element is indeed a bit of a game-changer; but no matter, it should prove but a minor inconvenience in the long run."

"I wouldn't be too quick to underestimate them," said Slade. "They may not be as old or experienced as the Justice League, but they are still capable of posing a credible threat."

"I understand," said the voice. "And fear not, I will nonetheless keep my eye on them just to be safe. But now, before we focus any further on the unexpected return of the Teen Titans, I believe that Savage had something else he originally wished to discuss with me?"

"Indeed," said Savage. "And having now indeed successfully initiated contact and gotten that other important topic out of the way for the moment, perhaps now we can discuss what we originally planned to discuss."

"Yes," said the voice. "But first, perhaps you could allow your compatriot to formally join in?"

Savage nodded, turned to Slade, and said, "You may now properly introduce yourself Slade, but I warn you, he prefers to be referred to as 'your malevolence' by everyone who isn't in his inner circle."

Slade raised his eyebrow, and then asked, "Must I?"

"Oh yes Deathstroke," said the voice inside the vortex. "I insist."

Savage smirked at Slade, who groaned, walked up in front of the vortex, and then scowled at the fourteen reptilian eyes that peeked out from within before making an exaggerated bow and dryly saying "Greetings your Malevolence."

The voice chuckled, and said, "Always the free spirited and more equal terms sort of fellow aren't you?"

Slade growled under his mask.

The voice chuckled, and then said, "Now my followers, let us discuss what Savage originally arranged for us to talk about. Shall we?"

Savage nodded, a predatory smile on his face. Slade simply stood where he was looking disinterested. The voice in the vortex chuckled again, and said, "Very well, let us begin."

The fourteen eyes looked intently at the two men who now dared to directly communicate with it, and the voice then said, "Savage, if I remember correctly, you wished to discuss with me about the Key of Dante that would allow for the unlocking and opening of a gate to my domain am I right?"

"Correct," said Savage.

"Well Savage," said the voice. "I will tell you this, as I'm sure you might be aware from what whoever told you about the existence of these keys might have already mentioned, they have been hidden away for centuries within their respective hiding spots. And as all of my underlings, my father's underlings, my brothers, my father, and myself know, we are the only ones who know the exact location of the multiple entrances that lead into them all, and that very few humans have been trusted with this powerful information. So therefore, you'd typically be better off beating randomly at a bush then to go searching for a way into my hidden crypt and getting your hands on the corporeal key to my realm."

"Indeed," said Savage. "But fortunately, we're talking to you right now, and you can tell us how to find the nearest entrance. No problem at all."

The voice chuckled, the central pair of eyes seeming to even raise its left eyebrow, and then it said, "Oh really? Did I say that I would do that?"

Upon hearing this, Savage narrowed his eyes, and said, "I believe we had a deal."

"A deal?" said the voice. "I'm pretty sure I would have remembered making a deal with you, especially considering both your particularly major status in the world and also what the currency of the deals my underlings make are."

Upon hearing this, Vandal Savage had to fight to keep himself from shouting at the being he was now talking to. "You said you were willing to give us a chance to help you achieve your current plans! Surely even someone as long in the tooth as you would understand that your current plan is incapable of success without that key?!"

"I do understand that," the voice growled, the fourteen red eyes narrowing angrily, "but I am also very careful in how I do my work. I have always been very careful in forming my countless plans, including the one I have currently chosen to attempt, and have been likewise careful in everything else I've done. And I will tell you this now, I am not going to end countless centuries' worth of carefulness just to increase my chances of leaving my domain early. And I'm certainly not going to blindly hand over this valuable information to you considering your responsibility for the fiasco that occurred involving a crime organization you created named after the Greco-Roman equivalent of my domain! Surely someone as decrepit and past expiration date as you would understand that, Vandar Adg?"

Savage winced upon hearing his old name from his time as a simple Cro-Magnon warrior, and he pointed at the fourteen red eyes in the vortex before saying, "Your Malevolence, I do not go by that name anymore. Please respect my wishes to be referred to by the name I've created to take its place."

"Then let me tell you this," said the voice. "I may not be as spiritually high class as my father and brothers, but you will still treat and speak to me with respect. Need I remind you that while my father was the one responsible for your arch-nemesis the Immortal Man finding and being endowed by the same comet that gave you your immortality, power, and intelligence, I was the one who first allowed for that comet to come down to Earth and be found by you in the first place? I could easily strip you of your immortality and send your soul plummeting down to my domain in the blink of an eye. Do not test your luck by insulting me."

The eyes looked down briefly, then looked back up to stare intently at Savage once more, and then the voice said, "It was only through sheer luck on your part that I was merciful enough to allow that foolish mortal thief to stumble upon my crypt and abscond with the Fallen Tools and Infernal Tablet and hide them where you could easily find them before my underlings caught up with and killed him. If you want to be able to go into the crypt yourself and get ahold of the Dante's Key that opens the gate to my realm, then you will need to earn the right to it."

Slade shook his head side to side. "I told you he wasn't to be trusted. His kin are never to be trusted. And believe me, I know."

The voice inside the vortex chuckled, the eyes turned to face Slade, and the voice then spoke, "What you say about me is both true and false. While I will not just hand over the knowledge of the nearest entrance to where the Infernal Key of Dante is located without good reason, I am willing to give you the chance to earn that knowledge. All I require is that you fulfill one simple task."

Slade glared at the vortex. "I didn't sign up to be an errand boy," he thought to himself.

Savage, however, was smiling hungrily as he saw how his plans still had the potential to yet continue smoothly on. "We accept this chance. What is it you want us to accomplish?"

"Like I said, it is a very easy task," said the voice. "As you are certainly aware, the Immortal Man isn't the only being to stand against me for the cause of my father and brothers. There are many others in existence in this world, both solitary and in teams. All I ask, is that before I deem you worthy of being given the knowledge you desire, you must simply arrange for an early trip to the afterlife for one such team of heroes who serve on the side of my father and brothers."

Savage considered this information to himself, and then nodded before saying, "Very well then; you have a deal. I shall send a squadron of your underlings to do away with the Doom Patrol tomorrow."

"No," the voice said with a tone of finality. "You will not be going after the Doom Patrol."

Savage's eyes narrowed. "And why is that?"

The voice growled in annoyance, and then responded, "The same reasons you believe that this team would make an ideal choice are the reasons I believe they are simply not worthy. Sure they even now continue a seemingly endless crusade against one of my biggest armies to my cause, and admittedly they gained some serious attention from both humans and the beings that live in the realms of my father and I more than once, but their glory days ended decades ago. Through the rules and nature of their leader, plus his refusal to let go of his obsessive personal crusade against the Brotherhood of Evil, they are so far behind and out of touch with the era that they have no hope of catching up with all the other heroes who have willingly allowed themselves to adapt and evolve with the times. Their thunder is almost all gone, and what little they have left isn't even enough to turn heads of entire cities anymore. Honestly, it would be a miracle for you to find two people who've heard of the Doom Patrol living together in the same house, much less the same city. At this point, any pansy amateur super villain could defeat them and no one would bat an eye. In fact, they could be wiped off the face of the earth and people would hardly notice any difference. No, if you want me to tell you the location of the nearest entrance to my crypt and get ahold of the Infernal Key, then you will need to eliminate a superhero team that the world will actually notice the absence of."

Slade turned his head to face Savage, his eyebrow raised as if to say, "You have any more stupid ideas?"

Savage thought to himself, and then said, "Perhaps the Shadowpact would be suitable for your purposes?"

The fourteen eyes positioned themselves as if the being they belonged to were thinking to itself and considering the offer. After a few minutes, Savage and Slade heard the voice say, "Hmm, I'll admit, the Shadowpact is indeed a much better choice than the Doom Patrol. After all, it certainly is more widely known and more competent then the Doom Patrol. Plus I'll admit that I do have a personal score to settle with one of its members; namely, Blue Devil. For not only does he still maintain his unworthy possession of my trident, but even now continues to misuse it for the purposes of good instead of the evil purposes I originally had it forged and designed for."

Savage smiled upon hearing all this. It seemed that he had now chosen just the right team to eliminate in exchange for the knowledge he desired.

But then the voice said, "But no, I'm afraid that settling my personal score with Blue Devil will have to wait; for while the Shadowpact is more widely recognized around the world and more credible a threat to my cause then the Doom Patrol, they are still far too obscure and overshadowed by certain other teams that serve the cause of my father to be suitable for the current purposes I ask of you. While the Shadowpact would be missed and their absence more likely to attract attention, their elimination would only cause a slight rustle in the world of crime fighting. I want you to cause a roar."

Savage now seemed to be very annoyed, and Slade shook his head side to side saying "tut, tut," in his mind.

"Fortunately," the voice said before Savage could run the risk of losing his temper, "I know the perfect team on my father's cause for you to go after."

"Of course you do," Slade thought to himself.

Savage smiled in an almost predatory glee, and said, "Let me guess, you wish for me and my partner to go after the Justice League?"

Slade raised his eyebrow upon hearing this. "I do believe that would be a bit over our heads Savage," he then said.

"Your compatriot is correct," said the voice. "While certainly not a bad choice, attempting to eliminate them, even with my underlings doing the dirty work, would be an exercise in futility. Besides, I have plans of my own for them. But fortunately, the team I have chosen for you to go after will be just as worthy, if not worthier."

Slade raised his eyebrow at the sound of this. "Why do I have a bad feeling I now know which team this being has chosen for us to eliminate?"

"Enlighten us," said Savage as he proceeded to fold his arms across his chest with an inquisitive look on his face.

The voice from within the fiery vortex chuckled, the fourteen red eyes narrowing and brightening with pleasure, and then said, "Well for starters, elimination of this particular team I have chosen will be appropriate in regard to how they are younger than the Justice League as a whole. As the sentiment goes, destroy the new material, and there will be nothing left to replace the old. Also, the loss of the team I have selected for you to go after would be particularly devastating for the teens and children of the world. For not only is this team just as popular among them as the Justice League, but they are also more accessible to them in regard to their relative similarities in regard to age-range."

The voice then chuckled as if having just now remembered something. "And finally, since they will soon be arriving right back in convenient range for you, a more perfect time to send my underlings after them couldn't be closer."

At this point, Slade was now almost entirely certain of what team of superheroes the being on the other side of the vortex had chosen for him and Savage to go after. For not only had the first two points it had made been the kind that he would have remembered being willing to use himself to convince potential lackeys of his own to attempt to prove their worth to him by going against them, but the last point that the voice had made matched perfectly with an earlier topic of Savage's discussion with it.

Savage raised his eyebrow, and then said, "You're saying . . . ?"

"Yes," said the voice. The fourteen eyes seemed to brighten up as if the being were smiling. "With all this information I have now mentioned in mind," the voice said as the eyes proceeded to rise upward as if the being were now repositioning itself to gaze more directly at the two men currently communicating with it, "what better team of superheroes to make an example out of, then the Teen Titans?"

**And just like that, the story begins! Dun, dun, dun! As of now, I am again hoping that you have all enjoyed this epic beginning to my first multi-chapter Teen Titans story on this website! And I also hope that you leave a nice healthy bunch of reviews! In fact, I very much recommend that you leave reviews. After all, my current plan is that the sooner I get 5-10 reviews for the newest posted chapter, the sooner I post the next chapter after I have finished writing it and my awesome Beta reader Montydragon has gone through it! So yeah, I hope you enjoyed! ^_^**

**Coming up next: The five core titans make it home to Jump City, and are given a warm welcome home by Titans East.**


	2. Welcome Home

**Hello everyone! I hope you're all ready, because here is the official first chapter of my personal Teen Titans Season 6 premiere. In this chapter, with the titans having now returned safely home from Tokyo, they are given a warm welcome back by the team polite enough to take care of things while they were away, Titans East. Here's to hoping you read, enjoy, and especially review!**

**But hopefully, you won't if I treat you to a little mail bag first:**

**HayleyR: I'm glad you're enjoying this story so far, and you're in luck! Here's the newest chapter! ^_^**

**TheForceIsStrongWithThisOne: You've certainly accurately described the situation as Slade making deals with the devil again, and I'm definitely happy to hear that I made this particular mystery being seem even more ominous then Trigon. He'll certainly turn out to be a little more worrisome in some regards than Trigon, that's for sure. And already I've said too much.**

**CleoArrow: I'm glad to see that you are enjoying this so far, and I'll definitely make sure to make the best effort at putting your advice about the paragraph lengths to good use.**

**Aurelianella: You're welcome, and I'm glad you're enjoying this so far. I hope you enjoy this new chapter!**

**And now, prepare to feast your eyes on the official first chapter of Night of the Cursed.**

**Chapter 1:**

**Welcome Home**

At exactly 12:00 pm the very next day, the T-Ship arrived home at Titans Tower in Jump City, California. Upon sight of the familiar silhouette of their home, Robin, Starfire, and Cyborg smiled happily, glad to finally be back home once more. Raven, meanwhile, let no emotion show on her typically blank face, but felt a slight sense of happiness deep inside underneath her blank façade. As for Beast Boy, he was currently still snoring away from the nap he'd ended up taking halfway through the journey home.

A few minutes later, Cyborg himself remembered this detail as he conveniently started hearing Beast Boy snoring once again. "Robin," he said into his com-link.

"Yes," said Robin.

"Should we wake up BB?"

Robin thought to himself. "Might as well," he then responded. "Go ahead."

Upon hearing this, Cyborg accessed Beast Boy's com-link, took a deep breath, and then promptly bellowed, "Yo BB! Wake up man!"

Beast Boy promptly awoke, letting out his trademark emasculating shriek. For a few precious minutes, he wildly looked from side to side, babbling incomprehensibly about danger and wondering what was going on. When he finally came to his senses, he happened to look in the direction of the Tower, and let his trademark toothy grin come on his face as he recognized the very obvious shape of the Titans' home base. "Well what do you know," he then said. "We've made it home."

"That we have Beast Boy," said Robin. "But don't get too excited, we'll probably still need to make a few minor repairs before we can relax."

At the sound of this comment, Beast Boy pouted inside his compartment. "You take the fun out of everything," he grumbled to himself. Cyborg simply nodded his head up and down nonchalantly with his human eye closed as if to say 'what will be, will be.' Raven, as usual, showed no emotion about this news at all. Starfire, meanwhile, looked as if she could care less about any work that would need to be done, as long as she got to spend some valuable quality time with Robin afterward.

But as it turned out, no repair work, or work period, would be necessary. A few minutes later, as the T-Ship came close enough to actually see the Tower itself as opposed to its dark silhouette on the horizon, Robin's eyes widened under his mask, and then he said, "Ok, looks like I might have spoken too soon."

The other titans followed their leader's gaze, and their eyes widened as they also noticed how the tower appeared to have been completely repaired over the course of the week they'd spent in Tokyo. Cyborg whistled after a few seconds. "Dang," he said. "I didn't think Bee had it in her."

Before they'd left to go to Tokyo, the Titans had made sure to have Titans East fill in for them while they were absent. Admittedly, they'd expected for their team's ancillary sister division from Steel City to do some repair work on the tower that was needed in the aftermath of Saico Tekk's attack on it, but they had not expected for them to completely repair the tower back to more or less the way it had been before Saico Tekk's attack.

Robin found himself directing a look of respect towards the tower. "I'll definitely give her and the rest of Titans East credit for knowing how to get the job done."

Starfire smiled ecstatically as she looked at the now very much repaired home base of her and her friends. "Oh how glorious!" she said. "Our home is no longer damaged!"

"It certainly doesn't look damaged anymore, that's for sure," Raven stated in her usual seemingly disinterested tone. "But they better not have gone into my room," she then added seemingly as an afterthought.

Beast Boy chuckled, his toothy grin back on his face, and said, "I say we really ought to thank Titans East for their help."

"Well that shouldn't be too hard," Robin stated seconds later after noticing five figures standing outside the tower right nearby the coast that was facing the oncoming T-Ship. "They're standing outside the tower right now to welcome us back."

And indeed they were. Standing right at the head of the relatively diamond-shaped formation on the coast was a tall African American girl who looked about the same age as Cyborg with two globe-shaped 'braids' in her hair, a pair of insect-like wings sprouting from her back, and dressed in a black and yellow striped outfit. Her hands were clenched into fists that she'd placed on her hips, and within her clenched fists she held two slightly harp or recurve bow shaped objects that appeared to have crackling beams of electricity in the places where the strings would have been located. The Titans needed only look at this girl and make note of these visual details plus the confident and determined look on her face to recognize her as Bumblebee, former student of the H.I.V.E. Academy turned honorary titan and leader of Titans East.

Standing behind Bumblebee to her left was a tall athletic ginger-haired boy wearing a reddish orange jumpsuit with yellow outlining around the edges. He had his arms folded across his chest, and a relaxed laidback look on his face that not even his domino mask that covered his eyes could hide. And of course, strapped to his back, was a large golden yellow longbow and a quiver full of mechanical arrows. Even without the presence of the bow and arrows, it would have been easy enough for the titans, particularly Robin, to recognize this boy as the honorary titan Speedy.

Another teenage boy stood to Speedy's right. Like Speedy, he had his arms folded across his chest. But aside from this positioning and his similar athletic, light skin tone, and lean bodily build, he looked very different from the ginger-haired archer. The outfit he wore was a dark blue unitard complete with black rubber gloves and boots. Also unlike Speedy, he had no mask, and allowed his obsidian colored eyes to be freely viewed by anyone who looked at him. And his hair, in stark contrast to Speedy's almost militaristically close cropped ginger hair, was pitch black and went all the way down to his shoulders. Upon sight, this boy was instantly recognizable as Aqualad.

Finally, standing close together directly behind the three teenagers were two small ginger-haired boys who looked as if they couldn't have been more than 10 or so years old dressed in white hooded tracksuits complete with yellow gloves and boots, streaks of red in various areas of their costumes. The two boys were obviously identical twins as they looked so much alike that one of the few ways anyone could tell them apart lay in how one of the boys had a bright yellow plus sign emblazoned on his shirt and the sides of his helmet while his brother had an equally bright yellow minus sign emblazoned in the same areas. Smiling giddily, they both joyously yelled in a mega-fast pace at the same time towards the approaching flying vehicle, "Bienvenido a casa amigos!"

Robin chuckled to himself upon hearing this. "Yep, Mas and Menos certainly haven't changed a bit," he said to himself. No sooner had he said this, when he found himself smirking privately to himself as he thought guiltily of how they would likely react to how he would respond in the hypothetical situation of Bumblebee or any of the two teenage boys in her team were to ask him if any news they'd heard of him and Starfire's now official status as boyfriend and girlfriend.

At the same time Robin was thinking about this, Beast Boy, Raven, and Cyborg were also thinking about this topic. "Those two twins had better have the sense not to try to go after Starfire anymore if they know what's good for them," the three titans thought to themselves in unison. And of course, Starfire had a joyous smile on her face as she thought of how very happy she would be to personally inform her Titans East friends of the truth behind any rumors they might have heard about her and Robin becoming a couple if they asked about it.

Meanwhile, on the island, Bumblebee smiled upon hearing the two Spanish speaking twins joyously shouting a welcome home greeting to the five core titans. "You've got that right boys," she said. "Our friends certainly deserve a nice happy welcome home from us." Aqualad and Speedy chuckled in agreement upon hearing this.

"You got that right," said Speedy.

"Yep," said Aqualad. "They're just awesome that way."

Five minutes later, the T-Ship landed a meter to the left of the assembled ancillary division of the Titans, and the five core titans proceeded to disembark. The five members of Titans East promptly walked up closer to their five friends.

Bumblebee had a smile on her dark face as she looked at the five familiar teen heroes of Jump City. "Good to see you're back home," she said.

"Thanks Bumblebee," said Robin. "I trust you and the others were able to take care of things smoothly in our absence?"

Bumblebee made a dismissive gesture and said, "Piece of cake. Aside from the occasional common criminal and the odd minor villain every now and then, things were pretty quiet around here. Not that I'm complaining."

"Damn right we're not complaining," said Speedy. "After all, I certainly enjoyed having all that time to relax, not to mention be guaranteed to have the tower all fixed up by the time you guys returned home."

Cyborg chuckled, and then said, "I can definitely agree with you there; I must say, I didn't think you had it in you Bee."

Bumblebee chuckled, and responded, "You know me; I get the job done. Heck, my team and I were even able to do it without interruptions from one of Speedy and Aqualad's constant arguments."

"Oh come on," Aqualad complained. "We do not argue _that_ often!"

"Actually," said Speedy. "We kind of do."

"Do not!" the Atlantean teen yelled indignantly.

"Do to!" the archer shouted back.

"Do not!"

"Do to!"

"Do not!"

"Do to!"

"Do not!"

"Do to!"

"Do not!"

"Do to!"

And just like that, the two teenage boys ended up arguing once again in their seemingly endless cycle of arguing and chumming. As this happened, Bumblebee, Mas and Menos, and the five founding members of the Teen Titans stared blankly at the tableau. Bumblebee rolled her eyes. The two Spanish twins said, "Aquí vamos de nuevo," in unison. Robin had a very similar annoyed look as the one that Bumblebee had on her face while Starfire seemed confused as to just what she should do. As for the other three members of the core titans, they just stared at the two arguing boys while shaking their heads from side to side.

Beast Boy then stared at Raven out of the corner of his eyes and said, "And they say _I'm_ the idiot in this equation."

"Of all the things they could do," Raven said in agreement. "Here they are arguing over how often they argue."

"Geez, can those two get any stupider?" Cyborg asked in agreement.

Eventually, Bumblebee gave both of the arguing boys an epic slap to the face at the same time, Aqualad with her left hand and Speedy with her right hand. "Enough with this!" she yelled the instant the two boys were no longer dazed. "Could you perhaps allow your meaningless eternity of arguing to be put on hold long enough for you to properly welcome your friends home?!"

Aqualad and Speedy gulped, looking very much chastened, and they proceeded to walk over to the five core titans, shoulders and heads slumped with embarrassment. At the sight of the two humiliated teenage boys, Mas and Menos started laughing uncontrollably.

"Teehee," said Mas. "Quemar caliente!"

"Te han machacado," said Menos.

Speedy turned his head to face the two twins, a look of just barely restrained rage on his face. "You are so lucky I still don't understand a word you say you little . . ."

Aqualad smacked him upside the head. "Dude," he shouted. "Keep it PG! We have ten year olds present!"

Right as Speedy turned his head to direct his glare at the Atlantean, Bumblebee raised her finger and said, "Ah yes, speaking of those two." She turned her head to look at the 10 year old twin speedsters. With a facial expression that looked half guilty grimace and half conniving smirk, she said, "You two little fellas might want to sit down."

The two 'little fellas' raised their eyebrows in confusion. "Que quieres decir?" they asked in unison. At the sight of the smug grins that appeared on the faces of their Atlantean and archer compatriots, the two Spanish-speaking twin speedsters found themselves having an eerie feeling that whatever their fearless leader was about to do would somehow not end well for them.

But even as they had that feeling, they didn't realize just how drastically they'd be effected until they heard Bumblebee say, "So Robin, forgive me if I sound like I'm intruding, but current word on the street here in Jump City freshly delivered somehow from Tokyo is that . . . well . . . how should I put this?"

The two twins promptly found themselves developing very worried looks on their faces. They had a mega-bad feeling now about just what Bumblebee was talking about. Aqualad and Speedy sniggered at the sight, clearly fighting to keep themselves from laughing. Meanwhile, Cyborg and Beast Boy were directing smug looks at their fearless leader that screamed 'do tell, do tell," while Raven looked at nothing in particular with her usual blank scowl on her face. Starfire, in stark contrast to everyone else, found herself blushing immensely as she felt the urge to proudly confirm in words that the news she had a feeling Bumblebee was referring to was indeed true.

And seconds later, Robin, with a surprisingly calm look on his face considering how he'd often reacted in the past to any situations regarding his painfully obvious romantic feelings towards Starfire being called to attention, grabbed onto Starfire's hands, let a small smile cross his face, and said, "If this news you are referring to goes anywhere along the lines of me and Star now being officially a romantic couple, then yes it's true."

At the sight of the shell-shocked and horrified looks that came on the faces of Mas and Menos upon hearing Robin say this, it took all of Speedy and Aqualad's willpower not to burst out laughing. Beast Boy and Cyborg, meanwhile, let proud smiles come on their faces as they saw how confidant their fearless leader now was in openly talking about his relationship with Starfire.

Bumblebee also smiled, and then looked at Starfire before saying, "What do you have to say about the rumors we've all been hearing recently about your relationship status?"

Robin raised his eyebrow with a suspicion filled glare on his face.

"Oh I trust you Robin," said Bumblebee upon noticing the look on his face. "But I'd like to hear the news from my fellow girl." Upon hearing this legitimate explanation, Robin calmed down slightly, but still looked relatively ticked off.

Bumblebee looked back at Starfire and said, "So? They true?"

Mas and Menos looked intently towards Starfire and Robin, looking as if the fate of their world depended on Starfire's answer. Seconds later, Starfire let out a joyous giggle, her eyes closed tight with joy, and leaped up on Robin from behind, wrapping her arms around his neck and shoulders in a loving embrace and said, "Oh indeed they are! My life couldn't be more joyous now that we are officially the boyfriend and girlfriend!" Upon hearing all this coming from the chipper Tamaranean beauty, Robin smiled warmly, not even bothering to complain this time about how her hug was as tight as be darn near suffocating as ever.

Upon seeing and hearing Starfire's reaction, Mas and Menos fainted, both falling flat on their backs and passing out in unison. At the sight of this, Aqualad and Speedy exploded into laughter. They didn't stop until they eventually awkwardly noticed how Bumblebee and the five native titans of Jump City were now staring at them with their eyebrows raised. The two now twice embarrassed teenage boys chuckled nervously and rubbed their hands across the backs of their heads.

Bumblebee rolled her eyes, looked back at the core titans and said, "I hope you don't have to live with this kind of thing every day Robin."

Robin chuckled, and responded, "The part that we just put a stop to for the moment, no. But the arguing, I can definitely relate to dealing with." As he said the last bit, he directed a meaningful look towards Beast Boy and Raven out of the corner of his eye.

At the sight of this, the two chromatically challenged titans in question directed a glare right back at their leader. "Why are you looking at me?!" Beast Boy's glare seemed to yell. Raven's glare, meanwhile, would have turned Robin dead as a dodo if looks could kill.

Fortunately, right at the same time this was happening, the sound of ten Titans communicators going off at the same time was heard. In a flash, Robin dutifully drew out his communicator, opened it up, and looked intently at the words on the screen before saying, "Trouble." All of two seconds passed after Robin said this before the sound of what appeared to be an explosion was heard from within Jump City, followed by what sounded like an ominous bestial roar.

At the sound of all this, the three conscious members of Titans East groaned. "Great just great," Bumblebee grumbled in annoyance. "You five just arrived home, and we get a call of trouble again."

Cyborg reached over Robin's shoulder and placed his hand on Bumblebee's shoulder. "Don't you worry," said the cybernetic teenager. "We've got this covered. Don't we guys?" Robin, Starfire, and Beast Boy smiled in agreement. Even Raven let a small smirk cross her face as she silently agreed with Cyborg.

Bumblebee stepped back with her hands raised in mock surrender. "Well goodness me, we'd better not stand in your way then."

Robin chuckled, and said, "Indeed you'd better not." He then turned to face his four team mates. "You ready guys?" The other four titans answered in the affirmative.

Bumblebee chuckled, folded her arms across her chest, and then said, "So I guess this is goodbye?"

"Until the next time Bee," said Cyborg. "But now it's time for the Teen Titans to kick some butt!"

Robin gave a small wave to Bumblebee and the four Titans East boys, and then said, "See you again sometime guys. And thanks again for the tower and sticking around to fill in for us while we were gone. But now, we're ready to get back to work. And on that note." He turned his head to face the city and yelled, "Titans go!"

The instant he shouted this, Robin lifted up his hands in the air, just in time for Starfire, who'd taken to the air the instant Robin had shouted the iconic battle cry of the Teen Titans, to grab onto his hands and soar off towards the city with her fearless leader and boyfriend in tow. Immediately after Starfire started flying off with Robin, Raven spread her arms out to her sides and then took off as she proceeded to levitate close behind. And right as Raven took to the air, Beast Boy jumped up in a backwards flip, turned into a pteranodon while in mid-air directly over Cyborg, and then lowered himself just enough to grab Cyborg by the shoulders with his talons before flying off after his team mates with Cyborg in his talons, screeching out a furious pterosaur battle cry. And as the titans made their way over to the scene of the current commotion in Jump City, they all had the same thought on their minds. Whoever was causing trouble in Jump City now was going to be in big trouble now. The Teen Titans were now home, and they were ready to get right back to work.

**And there you have it people! I hope you all enjoyed this chapter, and leave a nice large bunch of reviews (and remember, a minimum of 5 reviews is needed to unlock access to the next chapter once its complete and gone through Montydragon, and this time I won't be so lenient as to count reviews such as the rather meaningless ones left by some guest dude named anon that I ended up deleting). On another note, for those of you who had trouble understanding Mas and Menos, feel free to look up what they said on the internet for translations. On another note, I also hope you find yourselves looking extra forward to the battle that is sure to occur in the next chapter ^_^. Anyways, like I said, I hope you enjoyed reading this, and that you leave a nice good bunch of reviews (but no flames are allowed).**

**Coming up next: The Teen Titans formally get back in business in Jump City with a battle against Jump City's favorite biker, Johnny Rancid!**


	3. A Homecoming Brawl

**Alright everyone! I hope you're all ready for some more Teen Titanic awesomeness, because now that I've finally received 5 reviews for the chapter that came before this one, here is the next chapter at the ready for you to read. In this chapter, the titans officially get back in business at Jump City by battling its resident biker criminal, Johnny Rancid! Here's to hoping you guys all enjoy it and leave a nice healthy bunch of reviews! ;) And for that matter, I shall now give a warm thank you to my awesome Beta-reader Montydragon for his work on making sure this chapter was presentable for you guys.**

**A/N: Just to clear the air, I do not own Teen Titans or any other elements of the DC Universe.**

**And now, on with the story!**

**Chapter 2:**

**A Homecoming Brawl**

Johnny Rancid laughed maniacally as he zoomed down the long Jump City road on his red and black motorcycle, firing his energy pistol again and again in random directions, almost completely disregarding who or what he happened to be firing at. He chuckled as he witnessed the damage he caused and heard the screaming of the civilians. "That's right people!" He yelled. "This street belongs to Johnny Rancid!"

The instant he finished shouting this, Johnny fired yet another burst of red energy from his pistol. The blast struck the base of an electricity pylon, and it proceeded to topple over, causing the wires extending from either side of it to disconnect from the two pylons it had stood between. The downed pylon and the wires fell straight towards a 19-year old blonde girl walking nearby with three kids with metallic prosthetic limbs. She screamed and just barely managed to leap out of the way, pushing the kids to safety, before the pylon crash-landed hard on the ground where they'd been standing, and the wires also landed to the sides, sparks of electricity flying from the ends of the disconnected cables.

Johnny laughed, and let off another salvo of energy blasts. The bursts of energy blew out numerous windows on the buildings to either side of the young woman and the three physically handicapped children as well as several bricks from the walls. Screaming, the young woman proceeded to position herself over the three kids as if trying to shield them with her own body. Through sheer luck, she and the children she was shielding just barely managed to avoid getting struck by any of the shards of glass or bricks that rained down on the area surrounding them.

Johnny laughed again at the sight of this, and was just about to start letting off another round of energy blasts when a massive beam of brilliant blue sonic energy blasted the ground almost exactly one centimeter in front of the front tire of his motor cycle. "Whoa!" Johnny yelled as he found himself promptly gripping tightly onto both handlebars of his motorcycle as the vehicle started swerving awkwardly as a result of the close proximity of the blue laser beam. The criminal just barely managed to get his motorcycle under control and avoid falling over. The instant he got his bike back under control, he positioned it so that it was now sideways, and put it to a stop. He was smart enough to realize that now would probably not be the best time to attempt to continue allowing the motorcycle to be actively moving in this situation.

As he moved his energy pistol trying to find whatever had unleashed the unexpected blue laser, Johnny was taken by surprise again when his pistol was sent flying out of his hands as a result of what appeared to be a mysterious spinning red blur slamming into it. The pistol landed on the ground a couple meters away, and the red blur went flying right back towards wherever it had come from.

Johnny turned his head to follow the path of the red blur just in time to see it come to a stop in a familiar green-gloved hand, revealing itself to be a small red mechanical object reminiscent of a boomerang, but shaped slightly like a mixture between an X and a bird. He'd only just managed to recognize the object for what it truly was and made the connection between it, the blue laser, and the identity of who had now interrupted his fun when he heard the teenage boy who'd just caught the device yell, "Show's over Johnny! You're going to jail!" The four other teens behind the familiar spiky-haired boy directed similar glares as the one on their leader's face towards the biker as well.

Johnny let a small smirk cross his face, and he said, "Well, well, well, if it isn't the Teen Titans! Back from China I see?"

Beast Boy growled, a surprisingly animalistic noise considering the fact that he was currently in human form, and he yelled, "Oh we're back alright buddy!"

"And for the record," Raven droned, "we were in Japan you idiot."

Robin pointed at the muscular grayish-skinned biker and yelled, "Your dangerous road games end now Johnny!"

"You will not harm any more people!" Starfire yelled.

"That's right Johnny," said Cyborg. "Because we're now home again, and back in business."

"And no matter how you do the math," said Raven.

"It all adds up to you going down!" Beast Boy snarled.

However, much to the titans' brief surprise, Johnny only laughed. After his laughter ended for the moment, Johnny pointed back down the road in the direction from which he'd been riding his motorcycle down the street, and then said, "Oh really? Well, why don't you see what results you get when you add _this_ in to the equation?"

The titans barely had any time to process what Johnny could have possibly been referring to when they heard the same bestial mechanized roar they'd heard from outside the city once again. They turned their heads to look where Johnny was pointing just in time to see what appeared to be a giant robotic dinosaur lumbering out from an alleyway next to a tall building, not too far away from the one that the Titans were positioned on the roof of.

At the sight of Johnny's newest robotic 'pet,' the titans stared intently at it. Beast Boy even gulped. The mechanical creature appeared to have the same bodily shape as that of a tyrannosaurus rex, but was big enough to be much closer to the size of a giganotosaurus. Its large jaws looked like they'd been designed from the jaw-like blades of a steam shovel, it had three hook-like claws on both of its hands, two huge clawed feet that looked like a mixture between steam shovel blades and bulldozer shovels, and it had an immensely long tail that looked strong enough to uproot the building that the titans were standing on the roof of. As if to further add to the terrifying appearance, the robotic dinosaur had what looked half of an oversized buzz-saw blade on the back of its head positioned in a way that made it resemble spines arranged in a mohawked style, and its mechanical eyes were an ominous dark red. As the titans watched, these same intimidating eyes narrowed threateningly, the robotic beast positioned itself so that it was directly facing them, and it let out a furious roar of challenge.

Johnny smirked at the sight of all this, and proudly yelled, "Say hello to T-Wrex!"

Almost immediately after its master shouted its name, the robotic dinosaur lifted its head up to face the sky and let out a monumentally loud roar that would have sent some the most battle-hardened ordinary law-enforcement officials running for their mommies.

Fortunately, the Teen Titans were no mere ordinary law-enforcement officials, and they soon took back on their original combat ready stances and looks. "The bigger they are, the harder they fall," Robin growled. He then directed his gaze towards Johnny, spread his arms out and yelled, "Titans, go!"

The instant Robin shouted out the trademark call to battle for the titans, they all leaped off the roof of the building they were on. As Robin swooped downwards towards Johnny Rancid, he drew out his grappling hook and fired it at a small overhanging gargoyle on a wall of the building in front of the one he'd been standing on. The cable wrapped tightly around the stone statue's neck, and when Robin came close enough to the wall of the building the gargoyle was hanging from, he used his feet to propel himself away, only detaching the cable when his feet were just close enough to the top of a nearby street lamp for him to safely land there. Mere seconds after Robin's feet touched the top of the street lamp, he jumped downwards towards Johnny Rancid with his right foot positioned so that it was aimed right at the burly biker's face.

Rancid was caught by surprise, for he'd been expecting for Robin to jump off the lamp post in a way that would have allowed his feet to touch the ground first before attacking, and planned to catch the boy wonder by surprise by abruptly charging towards him on his motorcycle. The criminal only processed this for a few seconds before Robin's foot came crashing into his face and sent him flying off of his motorcycle.

Johnny landed right next to his energy pistol, which he hastily grabbed onto before getting up and opening fire at Robin. The teenage crime fighter drew out his bo staff and spun it around rapidly in circles like a professional martial artist, artfully deflecting the energy blasts away from him.

As Johnny was busy focusing on Robin, Starfire soared down towards the criminal, her eyes focused intently on the scene. Right when she was about a yard or two away from landing right next to Johnny, she sent a large star bolt flying from her right fist towards him. The biker just had time to see a bright green light from out of the corner of his eyes before he was hit by the burst of green energy and sent flying backward.

After landing, Johnny barely had any time at all to recover before he found himself under fire from a massive flurry of star bolts that the Tamaranean girl sent hurtling his way. And for good measure, she finished off her slew of attacks with a well-aimed laser shot from her eyes. At the sight of Starfire's laser beam blast heading towards him, he quickly raised up his hands, which were coated in armored wrist bands, in a defensive position. The beams were harmlessly absorbed into the wrist bands. The instant the beams had faded away, Johnny quickly pointed his energy pistol at Starfire, and struck her point blank in the chest with a blast of the red energy. Starfire shrieked in pain before falling out of the sky.

At the sound of Robin's angry yell that followed, Johnny Rancid turned his head to face Robin just in time to see the boy wonder lunging at him with his staff raised to strike at him. Johnny just barely managed to lift up his left wrist to parry the blow. And for the next few minutes, Robin continued to swing his bo staff furiously at Rancid while the biker just as quickly parried each blow with his armored wrist bands.

Eventually, Johnny swung his right foot at Robin, swiping the boy wonder's legs out from under him. Robin landed on his back and his staff was sent bouncing down the street away from him. Robin managed to lift his head up from the road in time to see Rancid standing not too far in front of him with his energy pistol aimed right at his face.

Fortunately, before Johnny could fire, Starfire slammed into him with a yell. The impact she slammed into Rancid with was enough for him to be pushed swiftly through the air by her before slamming into the wall of a nearby building.

Starfire swooped backward away from the building, preparing herself for if Johnny Rancid got up to attack again. And attack again he indeed did. He got up from his crumpled position, growled angrily at Starfire, and then jumped up high into the air. And as he plummeted down towards Starfire, he had his right fist raised up in the air as if about to slam it down hard on her.

"Eek!" Starfire yelled before she darted to her right just to avoid the crushing impact of Johnny's fist to her face. Instead, the criminal's fist struck the road hard enough to leave a large circle of cracks on it.

As Johnny turned his head in the direction Starfire had darted to escape, Robin threw a small disk-like object at Johnny. The disk came at Johnny too fast for the criminal to raise his wrists up to block it, and it crashed into him. Upon contact, the disk exploded, and revealed itself to be one of Robin's voltage disks when, instead of flames, tendrils of electricity spouted out and covered Johnny in a web of voltage.

At that moment, while Johnny was incapacitated by the electricity, Starfire flew high up into the air, her right fist raised, and then zoomed straight back down. Robin was able to jump into the air seconds before Starfire landed, slamming her fist so hard onto the ground that it caused a powerful shockwave. The area of effect produced by Starfire's ultra-powered fist slam sent Johnny flying backward.

Meanwhile, at the same time that Robin and Starfire were busy with Johnny, the other three titans were busy with fighting off Johnny's robotic dinosaur. This phase of the battle began with Cyborg activating his sonic cannon in his right arm once more while in mid-air before pointing it downwards towards the robotic beast and shooting its laser blast at it. The beam struck T-Wrex right on the top of its head with a bang, resulting in its buzz-saw shaped crest being blown to smithereens, and it roared in an almost angry tone.

Cyborg landed on the ground a couple inches away from the robot's right foot, which he proceeded to blast with his sonic cannon. The robotic monster roared, looked downward at the partially robotic nuisance that had now attacked it twice before snapping its jaws downwards towards him. Cyborg managed to leap away just in time to avoid getting gobbled up.

Beast Boy, who had been flying towards T-Wrex as a peregrine falcon, turned into a lion in mid-air right as he was two feet away from slamming right into the side of the robot's head. With a roar, Beast Boy proceeded to latch onto the left side of the creature's head, where he then started biting and scratching at it. The robotic monster growled, and started rapidly swinging its head around in random directions. The green lion latched onto its head managed to stalwartly hold on for the majority of the time. However, when T-Wrex abruptly lowered its head straight down, it was enough to catch Beast Boy off guard. And as a result, when T-Wrex then proceeded to rapidly lift its head right back upwards, the green lion was catapulted straight upwards into the air; and when Beast Boy started falling right back down towards the robotic monster, it positioned its head so that it was looking directly at the falling green lion and opened its jaws so that Beast Boy would land right inside.

Fortunately, Beast Boy was a resourcefully quick thinker in battle, and he transformed into an ankylosaurus seconds before he landed within the robotic dinosaur's jaws. And as a result, T-Wrex found its metallic 'fangs' crunching painfully into the rock-hard armor plated sides of an ankylosaurus instead of the soft furry lion flesh it had originally been expecting. Upon scrunching its 'fangs' up on the unexpected jawbreaker, it let out a metallic screech before spitting Beast Boy right out.

Beast Boy reverted back to human form as he hurtled down towards the ground, and upon landing managed to turn the impact into a small three step series of somersaults. After his third somersault, he landed with his hands and feet flat on the ground, and he slid backwards facing the robotic dinosaur. The creature glowered at him, its dark red mechanical eyes seeming to narrow in fury, and it let out another roar.

The roaring of the robotic dinosaur abruptly ended when it felt something heavy slam into the back of its head. It turned its head to look behind it in time to see Raven hovering a few feet behind its head, using her telekinetic shadow energy to lift up a large group of cars and other vehicles that the robot had smashed earlier.

The robotic monster glowered at Raven as she continued to hurl more and more smashed up cars, trucks, and other vehicles at it. It then roared, lifted up its long tail, and then swung it downwards straight towards her. Raven just barely had time to deploy a small shield of shadow energy in front of her, before the robotic dinosaur's tail slammed into the shield with such a colossal impact that not only did Raven lose concentration enough for the shield to vanish afterward, but she also fell right down onto the ground.

As Raven lay on the ground catching her breath, she heard T-Wrex roar, and she looked up in time to see it lift up its left foot in preparation to stomp on her. Raven was just preparing herself to summon a full-on shadow force field when the robotic dinosaur was abruptly sent staggering and off balance when the head of a large green brachiosaurus that abruptly appeared not too far away from it swung its neck in a way that allowed its head to smack into the robotic creature's side.

Soon afterward, T-Wrex managed to regain its footing and balance, and it turned around to face Beast Boy just in time to see the green sauropod rear up, its front legs lifted up and at the ready to be sent smashing into the robotic dinosaur. However, right as Beast Boy unleashed a groaning bellow as if announcing his oncoming attack, his robotic opponent charged straight towards him, ramming its head straight into his chest.

Beast Boy's furious bellow turned into a saurian squeal of surprise as the force of the robotic dinosaur's blow sent him falling down straight backwards. Beast Boy landed right on his back with his legs sticking upwards into the air and his belly now exposed. Upon eventually realizing that he felt a large object underneath him and hearing a familiar male voice yelling in pain and shock before the same voice then let out a series of unflattering grunts and growls, he also realized that he'd just pinned Cyborg underneath 60 tons of living, breathing dinosaur.

The roaring of T-Wrex brought Beast Boy back to attention, and he let out a surprised bellow when he saw that the robotic dinosaur had now lifted up its left paw in preparation to stomp down on the center of his exposed belly. Thinking quickly, Beast Boy turned into a hummingbird and zipped away just before T-Wrex's foot came crashing down on the area where he'd been. Fortunately, this area had not been the area where Cyborg was now lying down. In fact, Beast Boy took on the form of a cheetah soon after escaping from getting stomped on and landed right in front of Cyborg's feet. The robotic dinosaur leaned down so that its mechanical red eyes were looking straight at Beast Boy and Cyborg, glowered, and then roared.

In a flash, right as T-Wrex was roaring, Beast Boy the cheetah bolted right underneath the robotic dinosaur's chin and ran right between its legs. T-Wrex was taken by surprise, and it slowly turned around to face Beast Boy once again, only for the green cheetah to run right back between its legs all over again. T-Wrex growled in annoyance and turned to face Beast Boy and Cyborg all over again, only for Beast Boy to again run between its legs towards Raven. And for the next few minutes, Beast Boy continued to run back and forth between the robotic dinosaur's legs, all the while causing it to get dizzier and dizzier as it kept turning itself around to try to face Beast Boy. As Cyborg watched this, he whistled to himself and said, "Dang, you're smarter than you let on man." Even Raven found a small impressed smirk crossing her face. Beast Boy certainly knew how to use size differences to his advantage.

Eventually, after the umpteenth time Beast Boy ran between T-Wrex's legs to come up to Raven and the robotic dinosaur turned around to face Beast Boy, the robotic dinosaur finally lost its footing. The robotic beast had just enough time to let out a surprised roar before it fell straight backwards. Unfortunately, Cyborg was still standing now in the area where T-Wrex was now about to land, and he let out a surprised and worried groan as he belatedly started running further down the street to try to escape. But the robotic dinosaur was falling down too fast.

Cyborg just had time to scream as T-Wrex came inches away from landing right on him before he found himself shrieking again as he abruptly fell seemingly right through the road. In fact, Cyborg had stepped into a vortex of shadows that suddenly appeared on the street right in front of him, and he vanished through it from the area right as T-Wrex finally came crashing down onto the road.

Seconds later, a black vortex appeared right above the area to Raven and Beast Boy's right, and Cyborg fell right out onto the road, on his face. Beast Boy resumed his human form, looked at Cyborg, and asked, "You ok dude?"

Cyborg snorted, looked up at Beast Boy out of the corner of his human eye, and replied, "Meh, could be a lot worse. I could be stuck under the weight of _another_ dinosaur."

Beast Boy grinned sheepishly, rubbed his fingers through his hair, and said, "Eh, my bad."

The sound of metal clanging on the ground brought the three titans back to reality, and they turned to face where T-Wrex was in time to see that the robotic dinosaur had managed to position its tail so that it could get its feet firmly back on the ground and use that positioning as leverage to get itself fully upright once again. The three titans had time to gulp before T-Wrex roared and smacked them with its tail, sending them flying backward.

Meanwhile, Robin and Starfire were still busy battling Johnny Rancid himself. Robin was now sending his fists and feet flying at Johnny in a rapid flurry of martial arts moves. Johnny was just barely able to parry them all. But even Johnny couldn't parry Robin's attacks indefinitely, and Robin eventually managed to land a solid karate chop to Johnny's face, sending the biker stumbling backward.

Johnny attempted to use another leg sweep on Robin, but Robin was expecting it this time, and he back flipped out of reach. And as a result, Johnny was left open to getting hit by the laser shot that Starfire fired at him from her eyes. Johnny went sprawling, only to get up and barrel straight towards her and Robin with an angry yell, his helmeted head lowered as if he were a pachycephalosaurus. Starfire calmly flew out of the way while Robin calmly leaned so far to his right that only his left leg was still in Johnny's path. And so Robin tripped Johnny and sent him sprawling on his belly.

Johnny got up, looked at Robin, and growled before abruptly thrusting his left fist at Robin in a swift left jab. This move caught Robin off guard, and the boy wonder was sent flying when the blow got him right in the face. At the sight of this, a small smile came up on Johnny's face. Unfortunately for the criminal, he only had reason to smile for a few seconds before he felt someone kick him in the back.

Johnny stumbled forward a few inches before regaining his balance and then turning around to look behind him. Sure enough, Starfire was now right behind him, her fists raised as if she were now ready to try to punch him. Johnny snorted, and abruptly gave her a pounding head butt to the face with his helmeted head. However, the instant Johnny lifted his head back up to face Starfire again with a condescending smirk on his face, Starfire head butted him right back in his own face. Starfire's head butt attack was surprisingly stronger, and it sent Johnny rocketing backward. Robin cartwheeled out of the way of the flying criminal, and Johnny crash landed in a dumpster.

Meanwhile, Beast Boy, Raven, and Cyborg were still battling T-Wrex. After recovering from the blow they received from the robotic dinosaur's tail, they had now taken on a strategy that involved them flying in circles around it while firing long range attacks at it. In other words, Raven levitated around T-Wrex in a counter-clockwise direction while hurling orbs of shadow energy at it while Beast Boy flew around T-Wrex in a clockwise direction as a pteranodon while carrying Cyborg in his talons, and Cyborg fired his sonic cannon repeatedly at the robotic dinosaur.

"In your face, windup toy!" Cyborg yelled as he successfully blasted T-Wrex on the side of its face once more.

Unfortunately, Cyborg's joy at his successfully landing attacks on T-Wrex would prove short-lived, for the robotic dinosaur growled, and got itself into a battle-ready position. And when all three of the teenage heroes battling it were directly in front of its face, it unleashed a roar so loud and strong, that it sent the three teenagers careening away from it out of control.

One by one, Cyborg, Beast Boy, and Raven fell down on the ground once again. When they got up, they saw T-Wrex lift up its left foot and then stomp it back down, lift up its right foot and then stomp it back down, and then look directly at them before unleashing yet another roar of challenge at them.

Raven growled, and said, "We are so not making much progress against this thing."

"At this rate, it will take hours to defeat this thing the way we're currently doing it," Cyborg agreed.

Beast Boy growled, crouched down, and said, "Well I guess we'll just have to have it pick on something its own size!"

"Man," said Cyborg. "That monster is way bigger than your t-rex form."

Beast Boy directed a glare at Cyborg. "I didn't say I'd be battling it as a t-rex," he growled.

Before Cyborg could say anything else, Beast Boy turned his head to face T-Wrex once more, growled, and then proceeded to morph into a dinosaur that definitely wasn't a tyrannosaurus-rex. Cyborg and Raven gaped at Beast Boy, for the dinosaur he'd just now turned into was not something they'd ever seen him transform into before. While the massive carnivorous dinosaur that now stood before them with its back and tail facing them had the right bodily shape for a t-rex, it was much bigger, had slightly longer arms with three claws on each hand, and had a row of spike-like ridges lining the top of its head, the back of its neck, and its back. Only Beast Boy currently knew that he had transformed into a giganotosaurus. But right now, the important thing that the other titans needed to know now was that the dinosaur he'd turned into was the exact same height as T-Wrex. As T-Wrex gaped at Beast Boy with a facial expression that bordered on shock, the green giganotosaurus that stood before it growled, lowered its head, and then jerked it right back so that it was staring at T-Wrex face-to-face, letting out an even more menacing roar of challenge of its own.

Raven shook her head at the sight of the two dinosaurs that now stood facing each other. "Well, this should be interesting," she said.

Seconds later, T-Wrex's characteristic stern glare came back on its face, and it let out an angry mechanized roar at the same time that Beast Boy let out his own more life-like roar. After Beast Boy and T-Wrex had finished unleashing their roars of challenge, they proceeded to charge towards each other, the earth shaking underneath their feet as they stomped rapidly towards each other.

The epic battle began with the two gigantic beasts crashing their heads together. They came apart and roared at each other. T-Wrex growled, and reared upward, its jaws open and ready to bite at Beast Boy. However, Beast Boy, not being made of metal, was faster in his movements then the bulkier robotic dinosaur, and as his robotic opponent was letting out its angry roar as if to announce its oncoming attack, he lowered his head downwards to the right, and then swiftly lifted it upwards to the left, smashing the top of his head into T-Wrex's chin.

This attack sent T-Wrex stumbling backwards briefly, and it managed to regain its footing and shake itself out of dizziness a few minutes later. However, T-Wrex had only just managed to get its head positioned to look directly at Beast Boy when the giant green giganotosaurus crashed headfirst into the robotic dinosaur's chest with a powerful charging attack. The impact of this attack was enough for Beast Boy to push T-Wrex backward for at least a yard before the robotic dinosaur managed to regain firm footing on the ground and then push Beast Boy away by forcefully leaning forward.

Beast Boy stumbled backwards for a few seconds; and when he managed to regain his footing and recover from his momentary dizziness, he saw T-Wrex roar at him before swinging its massive tail straight at his head. Beast Boy ducked, and the heavy metal tail swung harmlessly over his head. T-Wrex, having expected its tail to meet resistance from crashing into the side of Beast Boy's head, found itself staggering off balance with its back facing Beast Boy.

Beast Boy promptly took advantage of his opponent now being off balance by swinging his own tail at it. Beast Boy's tail gave T-Wrex a firm smacking right on its backside, sending the robotic dinosaur flying forward before crashing down hard on the ground on its belly. The robotic dinosaur growled, positioned its legs and arms so that it was able to get itself back on its feet, and turned around to face Beast Boy before roaring again.

Unfortunately for the robotic dinosaur, Beast Boy had already started running towards it with his head positioned so as to be unleashing a second charging head slam attack before T-Wrex had even started turning itself back around to face him, and the green giganotosaurus slammed his head into T-Wrex's chest yet again and sent it stumbling backwards once more.

T-Wrex shook its head side to side to regain its bearings, and it let out another roar. But again, Beast Boy struck while T-Wrex was busy roaring, and he bit the robotic dinosaur on the neck and pulled it slightly to its right before abruptly letting go, causing T-Wrex to go stumbling to the side.

T-Wrex barely had time to even start lifting its head up again before Beast Boy began to unleash a mass flurry of physical attacks from his jaws, tail, and top of his head. T-Wrex, being made out of metal, was too bulky to move fast enough to dodge or effectively counter-attack its flesh and blood opponent, and it tried to give ground. But the green giganotosaurus kept moving forward and keeping as short of a distance between it and the robotic dinosaur as possible. Eventually, Beast Boy finished his grand show of attacks by lowering his head and then raising it up so fast that the top of his head collided with T-Wrex's chin, sending the robotic dinosaur flying backwards.

T-Wrex landed on its side; and within a few seconds, it wheezed, and then slowly managed to get its feet firmly positioned on the ground once more. However, before T-Wrex even had a chance to straighten its legs up and get itself to full height, Beast Boy plowed into the robotic dinosaur's right side, knocking it off balance once again. And this time, Beast Boy didn't give T-Wrex a chance to regain its balance, proceeding to latch his jaws tightly around the robotic dinosaur's neck, and then tightly move his head upward, twisting the robotic dinosaur's neck until its head came popping right off of its body. T-Wrex's head went flying through the air before coming to a crash land right in front of Cyborg and Raven. The two titans gulped upon sight of the severed robotic head with its previously malice-filled and ferocious mechanical red eyes now stuck in what looked like an expression of shock.

And as the Cyborg and Raven proceeded to look back at Beast Boy once more, they watched in stunned silence as the green giganotosaurus proceeded to lay into the headless body of T-Wrex with all it had using its fangs, tail, and claws, slowly ripping it into countless pieces. Before long, all that was left of T-Wrex was numerous assorted mechanical pieces and what looked like a small generator engine that allowed for it to function. Robin and Starfire also managed to watch the last of the carnage while holding down the lid of the dumpster that Johnny had landed inside earlier, and Robin found himself silently impressed with Beast Boy's work. Seconds later, Robin abruptly thought of an idea, and he whistled and beckoned for Beast Boy to come over.

Beast Boy growled, and came barreling over to where Robin and Starfire were. Robin grinned at the dinosaur, quickly pointed at the dumpster, and then after signaling to Starfire, he removed his hand from the dumpster lid. Starfire did the same, and Johnny lifted up the lid just in time to find himself staring right at the furious face of Beast Boy the giganotosaurus.

Upon finding himself abruptly face-to-face with a gigantic flesh and blood dinosaur, Johnny gulped, turned his head to his left, and saw the wreckage that remained of T-Wrex. Gulping again, he then turned his head to face Beast Boy, chuckling and grinning nervously when he heard Beast Boy growl. Seconds later, Beast Boy snapped his jaws open and let out a furious roar. Johnny screamed, ducked back inside the dumpster, and slammed the lid shut. "I surrender!" yelled his voice from within the dumpster. "Just don't let that thing eat me!"

Robin chuckled, and gave Beast Boy a thumbs up right as Cyborg and Raven made it all the way over to where Beast Boy had now gathered up with Robin and Starfire. Beast Boy growled at the dumpster, placed his right foot lightly upon the lid of the dumpster, and then lifted his head upwards to face the sky before unleashing a triumphant roar. The titans had now defeated Johnny Rancid and won their first battle to occur upon their return to Jump City. If there'd been any doubt about it before, there was now no more doubts. The teen titans truly were now back in business.

. . . . .

"This isn't over!" Johnny yelled as he was escorted into a police transport by the officers who'd come to take him away. "I will get out again eventually, and I will fight you again when I do! You haven't seen the last of Johnny Rancid!" After he finished shouting the last bit, the back doors to the police transport were slammed shut on Johnny, and the police proceeded to head off to take him to the Jump City Prison.

Robin smiled as he watched the police carting Johnny Rancid away. "All in all, yet another job well done," he thought to himself. Smiling still, he turned around to face the other titans and said, "Nice work team."

Beast Boy chuckled, clasped his hands together lazily behind his back, and said, "Are we awesome or what?"

"We certainly taught good old Johnny Rancid who's the boss, that's for sure," said Cyborg with a grin.

"Whatever," said Raven, her arms folded across her chest and her face as blank, emotionless, and seemingly full of disinterest as ever.

Robin smiled, slammed his right fist into his open left palm, and said, "Well now that this bit of business is over, I say we head back to the tower."

"Took the words right out of my mouth man," said Cyborg.

Right as the titans were preparing themselves to head off back to Titans Tower, they heard a female voice behind them say, "Excuse me, do you guys have a minute?"

The five teenage heroes turned their heads to look behind them, and saw the same 19 year old blonde girl Johnny Rancid had been menacing directly before they'd intervened standing a couple inches behind them. The three little kids she'd been with were standing right behind her. As the titans looked at the young woman they'd saved who now appeared to have come to talk to them, Cyborg happened to notice that the three little kids, one of them a dark haired Caucasian boy with a metallic right hand, a ginger-haired girl with a prosthetic right leg, and a blonde boy with a prosthetic left arm, appeared to be looking directly at him with looks of awe on their faces.

The blonde girl clasped her hands together as if wringing them, looked down towards her hands as if feeling self-conscious, and then said, "I didn't get the chance earlier, but I wanted to thank you for saving me and these kids earlier."

The titans found themselves awkwardly looking at each other, uncertain as to what to do in response. Admittedly, this hadn't been the first time they'd been directly thanked by civilians they'd saved. However, very few of these instances had truly been moments of genuine gratitude as opposed to characteristic schmoozing from crazed fan-girls and fan-boys, heat of the moment comments to occur directly after having been immediately saved, or obligatory statements of thanks made purely for the sake of politeness more than for genuine gratitude. In other words, the titans had rarely ever been thanked and left feeling in the future as if the thanks they'd been given was truly real. In fact, one of the few incidents in which they'd felt genuine gratitude from people they'd saved had occurred when they'd been thanked personally by the mayor and citizens of Tokyo, who'd treated them with surprisingly more gratitude than even the government of their own home town had treated them with at times.

The civilian girl standing before them seemed to sense this, and she grasped onto Cyborg's hand with both of her own. The other titans gaped at her with shocked expressions on their faces. The girl smiled warmly, and the titans only then noticed the very sincerely grateful look in her sky-blue eyes and the eyes of the three physically handicapped children. "I mean it," the blonde girl said. "I truly am grateful for what you've now done for me and these children today. I'm especially grateful for you." She said the last bit while looking Cyborg directly in the eyes.

Cyborg directed his gaze to his left, a slight blush coming on the human part of his face, and he said shyly, "You're welcome. Heh, heh, all in a day's work you know?"

"Nonetheless," said the blonde as she continued to gaze thankfully at Cyborg. "Thank you still. If it hadn't been for your team, and especially for you as a result of your well-timed sonic laser blast, I could very likely have died today, and so could have these three children. You and your friends saved my life today, and I truly couldn't be more grateful, and I also believe that no one else in this city truly understands how grateful they should be towards you. For continuing to do your job even in spite of this, and for what you have done for me today, I truly am thankful."

The titans gulped, and hung their heads with self-conscious looks on their faces. At this point, not even Raven with her empathic emotion sensing abilities or Beast Boy with his animal instincts could deny how truly grateful and sincere this young woman was being in her thanking them, and especially Cyborg. In fact, even the three 10-year old children showed crystal clear signs of genuine gratitude, for they had artless and genuinely thankful smiles on their faces that made them seem to glow with happiness.

The blonde boy stepped forward, his non cybernetic thumb raised towards Cyborg, and said, "She's right. You guys are awesome, especially you Cyborg."

Cyborg chuckled nervously, and said, "You really think so?"

"Sure we do," the red-haired girl happily squealed.

"Yeah," said the dark haired boy. "We're among your biggest fans; and so is my elder brother. Believe me, ever since he met you five years ago, he's never stopped idolizing you Cyborg."

After Cyborg heard this, he abruptly realized that this dark haired boy actually looked slightly familiar. In fact, he looked very similar to a young boy with a prosthetic left hand he'd once met five years ago on a day he'd ended up dealing with a dying power cell at an inopportune moment. "That kid must've been this boy's brother," Cyborg thought to himself.

Smiling, Cyborg said, "Well, I'm glad you guys view me so highly."

The three kids giggled, looked each other in the eyes, and then turned their heads to face Cyborg again before asking in unison, "Can I have your autograph?"

Cyborg blushed, and looked over at his four teammates. All of them had smiles on their faces. Even Raven had a wistful smile on her face. Cyborg looked back at the kids, a grin on his face, and said, "You sure can little fellas. Anyone have a pen handy?"

The blonde girl drew a pen out from her pants pocket and handed it to Cyborg. A few minutes later, Cyborg had proceeded to sign his hero identity on a page in a notebook the red head girl had handed to him, the back of the blonde boy's t-shirt, and a baseball that the dark haired boy had presented to him. The three children smiled giddily, and then proceeded to walk back behind their elder chaperone. The young blonde woman smiled once more at the titans, gave them a small wave, and said, "I hope to see you around again sometime."

"Thanks," said Cyborg. "Hope to see you around again to."

The other titans nodded in agreement with Cyborg, genuinely hoping to see this young woman again.

A few minutes later, long after the woman and three children had left the sight of the titans, Cyborg abruptly face palmed himself and let out a groan. The other titans looked at him, and he then said, "Darn it! I forgot to get her name!"

Starfire placed her hand on Cyborg's shoulder in a sympathetic gesture. "There, there, Cyborg," said the Tamaranean. "Don't despair. I'm sure we will see her again and you'll be able to get her name then."

"Yeah," said Raven. "I mean, it's not like she's going to just vanish off the face of the Earth. I'm sure you'll get another chance to talk to her some more, not to mention we'll get another chance to get to know her some more as well."

"I certainly hope we get to meet her some more again," Beast Boy agreed as he directed a toothy grin in the direction the young woman and three children had departed. "She sounds pretty cool, not to mention she actually thanked us and meant it when she did so."

"I definitely have to agree with you there Beast Boy," said Robin with a respectful smile on his face. "It's not every day we meet people like her who truly feel grateful for what we do. I definitely say we ought to make an effort to get to know her some more. She could very well prove a valuable ally."

Cyborg smiled at his supportive friends. He looked back in the direction that the young woman and the three children had left, his smile still on his face, and then said, "Thanks guys. You really are great friends."

Beast Boy chuckled, placed his hand on his partially robotic best friend's shoulder in a companionable gesture, and said, "Couldn't have it any other way dude."

The five teenage heroes spent a few more minutes standing where they were, looking proudly in the direction that their potential new friend had gone, feeling very proud of themselves. Eventually, Robin turned his head to face the direction of Titans Tower, turned his entire body around, and then said, "Come on team. Let's go home."

**And just like that, that's the end of this chapter! I especially hope you enjoyed the battle scenes in this chapter! And on that note, please tell me what you thought about my writing for those scenes. I really enjoyed writing the battle, and I hope that you guys think I did a good job at it (and if I didn't, by all means please give me some constructive criticism on how I could improve my writing of battles to occur in the future). On another note, though I'm pretty sure the answer will be obvious to anyone who's read any of the comics (whether it be the Teen Titans Go comics that were based on the original cartoon Teen Titans series or the original DC comics that the show was based on), any one willing to guess who that 'mystery' young blonde woman with the three handicapped kids was? And for that matter, I'd better warn all ardent fans of Cybee that they might not be very happy about this little element. And on another note, in case any of you are wondering what I'm referring to by my description of when Cyborg met that one particular kid's brother, I am referring to when Cyborg met that kid in the episode 'Sum of his Parts'. Well, on another note, I again hope you guys enjoyed reading this and leave a nice healthy bunch of reviews. Remember, 5 reviews is the minimum number required for you guys to post before I post the next chapter (and even after that, when I post it will depend both on when I finish writing it and when my awesome Beta reader Montydragon finishes going over it). Again, hope you had fun!**

**Coming up next: After all the excitement of returning home from Tokyo and the battle with Johnny Rancid, the titans have a relatively peaceful, relaxing, and easy-going night in the tower. However, that doesn't necessarily mean that the night will stay peaceful all the way till morning.**


	4. A Quiet Evening at Titans Tower

**Hey ya'll! I hope you're all ready for some more Teen Titanic awesomeness, because here's a new chapter! In this chapter, with all the excitement of getting home from Tokyo and battling Johnny Rancid out of the way, our five favorite teenage heroes have a very relaxing night at the tower. But the question is, will the night continue to remain peaceful after they've all gone to bed? Well anyway, I hope you read, review, and enjoy!**

**A/N: In case any of you didn't know already, I most certainly do not own Teen Titans. And to further clarify on a small detail in this chapter, I do not own the Mortal Instruments book series either.**

**Now, onward with the fic!**

**Chapter 3:**

**A Quiet Evening at Titans Tower**

At 6:00 pm that night, the titans were gathered around in the kitchen area of the Tower heartily feasting on their favorite hometown dish, pizza. Having very recently gotten home from Tokyo that very day, Robin had decided that a pizza dinner would be a good way to unofficially celebrate their return home.

Beast Boy, as usual, was hungrily laying his fangs into his usual vegetarian pizza. Starfire was slowly consuming each slice of her anchovy pizza one by one, and also drowning each slice with a generous serving of mustard. Cyborg, of course, was devouring his hefty meat lovers' pizza so hungrily and quickly that he made Beast Boy look like a finishing school graduate. Raven, in stark contrast, was slowly and calmly eating her small cheese pizza, trying her best not to openly show her disgust at Cyborg's horrendous table manners. Even Robin was digging into a pizza of his own, a medium sized pepperoni pizza. And to make things even better, for the sake of not spoiling the mood for everyone, Beast Boy and Cyborg even chose to forgo their usual pizza dinner traditions that involved Beast Boy trying to get his teammates to try a bite of his vegetarian pizza and Cyborg going into a long-winded rant at Beast Boy about the joys of eating meat.

However, there was one tradition of Teen Titans pizza dinners that, just getting back from vacation or no, could not be ignored. The tradition in question, was the 'who gets to eat the last slice of pizza' moment. The slice in question for this night just happened to come from Raven's cheese pizza. And so, Raven was the first to stretch out her hand; but nevertheless, the hands of all five of the titans slammed down on the pizza slice at the same time.

As one, the titans glared at each other, and then lifted their hands off of the pizza slice.

"Come on," Cyborg yelled. "I totally deserve that last slice! I almost got squashed to death!"

"Dude," yelled Beast Boy. "For the third time, that was an accident! And besides, I'm the one who ended up finally trashing that stupid robot! If anyone deserves that slice, it's me!" Immediately after shouting this, Beast Boy snatched up the slice of pizza into his hand. However, before the green shape shifter could eat it, Cyborg reached over and tried to snatch it from his verdant green friend.

"Dude," Beast Boy yelled. "Hands off!"

"No way!" Cyborg shouted. "There's only one person in this tower who's gonna eat that slice of pizza, and it aint you!"

This brief squabble lasted for all of three minutes, with Starfire and Robin clearly itching to butt in with their own reasons for wanting to eat the slice of pizza before Raven abruptly roared, "ENOUGH!"

The other four titans turned their heads to gaze at Raven. The gray-skinned girl glared at them, and stated slowly, yet venomously, "Perhaps over the course of our little vacation, you guys all forgot that we only do this little tradition when we have _one_ pizza shared between the five of us. If we each have our own individual pizza, each of us gets to eat the last slice of his or her respective pizza. Therefore, would it kill you or permanently damage your thick heads in any way to even _consider_ that since the pizza involved in this equation is _my_ pizza, _I_ should have the right to eat the last slice?"

The other four titans were stunned silent for a few seconds. Then Robin and Starfire looked at each other guiltily before sitting back with their hands raised up in 'surrender' gestures. Cyborg gulped, drew his hands back to his own personal space and turned away with an embarrassed look on his face. Beast Boy, meanwhile, hung his head, his ears drooping and his face showing a look of very clear guilt and regret.

With his saddened look still on his face, Beast Boy looked back up to face Raven, slowly handed the pizza slice towards her, and said, "Here. Go ahead. It's yours to eat, and I . . . we should've respected that. I'm sorry."

Raven momentarily gaped uncomprehendingly at Beast Boy, only to then have a slightly chastened look of her own come on her face as she realized through her empathic abilities how the green boy sitting before her handing her pizza slice back was genuinely sorry and feeling guilty about the whole mess. She gingerly reached forward, grabbed onto her pizza slice, and said, "Thanks; um, apology accepted."

"It's ok," said Beast Boy, a slight nervous grin coming up on his face. "What are friends for?"

After an awkward silence of two minutes or so, Robin decided to change the subject and let Raven eat her last slice of pizza in peace. He turned to Beast Boy and said, "You know Beast Boy, I happened to look through the drawers where we keep our video games and video game technology, and I noticed that there was a small box in there with a note on it."

Beast Boy turned his head to face Robin. "There was?"

"Yeah, hold on," said Robin as he proceeded to get up from his chair and head over to the drawers in question. When Robin came back, he was holding a cardboard box with a post-it note on top that said 'Do not open this unless you are Beast Boy or one of the other members of the local Jump City Teen Titans.'

Beast Boy directed a look of curiosity at the box, and proceeded to grab onto it when Robin handed it to him. Beast Boy opened it up, looked inside, and smiled happily as he proceeded to reach inside and pull out none other than what appeared to be a video game designed for their Play Station System.

"I forgot that this was set to be released for sale in stores here the day we left for Tokyo," Beast Boy squealed happily as he looked joyously at the video game that he now clutched in his hands.

"What is it?" Cyborg asked.

Beast Boy gaped at Cyborg in shock. "Dude!" He yelled. "It's _Mutant Madness_! The very first game in the brand new franchise of the same name now being produced by the company that produced the Mega Monkeys and Super Ninja Fury franchises!"

Beast Boy looked back at the game, his ecstatic toothy grin back on his face, and proceeded to explain, "The premise; five teenagers have been subjected to illegal genetic testing involving combining their DNA with that of wild animals. The results of the mixtures caused the teens to mutate into humanoid versions of each respective animal that they had their blood mixed with the DNA of. And now, after later learning while being kept in the facilities of the lab that turned them that the lab people plan to use this genetic experimentation and all the resulting mutants that could be created as weapons, they now have to escape from the lab and then try to put a stop to the people in charge of the project."

Robin thought to himself, and then said, "I'll definitely admit, that sounds actually kind of fun. How many players does it allow for?"

"Maximum of five," said Beast Boy.

"Hmm," said Robin. "Well in that case, it probably wouldn't be too bad for you, me, and Cy to play this."

"I'm definitely game," said Beast Boy. He looked at Cyborg and asked, "What about you? Wanna play?"

Cyborg pointed his finger at Beast Boy and said, "Yes, but first, when did you first hear about this new video game series being in development?"

"Couple months ago," said Beast Boy.

"And how come I was not made aware of this?"

Beast Boy chuckled nervously, ran his left hand through his spiky chartreuse hair, and said, "Um, well, I . . ."

"I'm sure he just wanted to keep it a surprise for you all," Raven stated.

"Well yeah," Beast Boy stated. "That was one of the reasons I didn't mention this to Cy."

"_One_ of the reasons?" Cyborg asked.

"Please," said Starfire. "Must we fight each other so soon after getting home from our glorious vacation?"

Cyborg gulped, and looked at Starfire with a guilty grimace. "Er, no," said Cyborg. "I'm good, just surprised is all." Robin and Beast Boy smirked as they watched Cyborg's reaction.

"Leave it to Star to smooth things over before they erupted," Robin thought admiringly to himself.

Cyborg then turned his head to face the other two boys, clasped his hands together, and then said, "Well then, who's ready to play?"

. . . . .

"I've gotta admit," said Robin as he furiously mashed on the controls about an hour or so later, "this is actually pretty fun."

The three boys had spent the last hour or so after dinner playing their brand new video game. And as Robin had now admitted, they were having quite a lot of fun. At the moment, Robin's character, a humanoid lion with pyrokinetic abilities and an ultrasonic roar, was knee deep in combat against armed lab security guards in the first chapter of the game's storyline and had just now used the ultrasonic roar to defeat at least ten or so enemies surrounding it all at once. Beast Boy's character, a humanoid crocodile with geokinetic abilities, the ability to summon poisonous gas, and a corrosive slime breath attack was hard at work in destroying a series of power generators keeping a force field barring the game characters' progress active. As for Cyborg, he currently had his character, a humanoid rhinoceros with cryokinetic abilities, super strength, and an ultra-fast charging attack fighting the lab security guards alongside Robin's character.

Cyborg smiled as he proceeded to cause his character to fully deplete the HP of three of the game enemies with well-aimed icicle blasts fired from its hands. "I gotta hand it to you BB," the half-robot teenager stated. "You sure have good taste in video games."

"Thanks dude," said Beast Boy as he proceeded to have his character blast the final power generator to smithereens with its acidic breath attack, triggering a cut scene. "I'll bet your glad Aqualad remembered that this game was released for sale in stores here while we were gone huh?"

"You've got that right," Cyborg replied before proceeding to redirect his attention to watching the cut scene.

Meanwhile, from within the kitchen area, Starfire was leaning on the counter top where the stools were located, intently watching the boys and what was unfolding on the screen. She couldn't help but smile as she watched Robin enjoying himself with the Earth activity that he seemed to enjoy taking part in alongside Cyborg and Beast Boy so much. She always liked how happy he seemed to be when he was playing these games with the other boys. In her opinion, this happy version of Robin that was present whenever he played video games was much better than the aloof, guarded, and antisocial Robin that was often present whenever involved with investigations, or one of his, she shuddered at even thinking of the name, personal Slade obsession modes.

On the other side of the counter, Raven was hovering a foot or so away over the ground, reading a book. At the moment, she was currently rereading Cassandra Clare's _The Mortal Instruments_ series, and was now on the sixth book, _City of Heavenly Fire_. She felt a small smile coming on her face as she read a particularly exciting part. Out of all the books in the considerable number she'd read and reread in her life time, she'd always enjoyed books that involved supernatural elements. She'd always felt a bit of a kinship for the characters and worlds within such stories due to her own rather supernatural heritage. And of course, as she read her book, she paid barely any attention whatsoever to the boys and the events unfolding on the TV screen.

Beast Boy, however, somehow was now finding himself capable of stealing slight glances towards Raven out of the corner of his eyes every now and then, and still maintain near perfect focus on the video game at the same time. And while the gazes he'd direct at Raven every now and then only ever lasted for at least five seconds or so, he couldn't help but remember the surprisingly large number of things about her that he'd come to make a note of.

In recent times, heck perhaps maybe even since the day they'd first met, he'd always found himself rather enjoying how pale and pristine her pale grayish skin seemed to make her look when illuminated just right under the light of the moon. He also thought that her amethyst purple eyes were surprisingly easy to get lost into if he were to ever somehow stare at them long enough. Also, and this was something he was really embarrassed about, the musty smell of lavender and tea that wafted off of her was enough to get all the animal minds inside him yammering and rambling in a way that made them sound as if they were in heat, something that not even the mountain pine tree scent he remembered to always be lingering on Terra had managed to achieve. Finally, he couldn't help but admit that her short deep violet purple hair, with its very much characteristic short style, made her look surprisingly pretty to him in a rather mysterious and enchanting way that he guiltily found himself thinking put even Terra in all her drop dead gorgeous glory to shame.

Growling silently in annoyance, Beast Boy shoved these thoughts about Raven back into the back of his mind and resumed his full attention on the game. "I'll think more about this stuff later," he thought to himself. "I've already done a good job at handling this long enough to reach this point, and I can continue to handle it for another few days or so. And I'm certainly not going to dwell on it right now, especially since I'm pretty sure a boss battle will soon be occurring if I remember what I read in the online strategy guide I read about this game correctly." And so, Beast Boy, Cyborg, and Robin continued to play the game, Starfire continued to watch, and Raven continued to read her book. At that moment, it seemed as if nothing could possibly ruin the relaxing night the titans were currently enjoying in their tower.

Eventually, at exactly 8:00 pm, the three boys finally reached a good stopping point in their game, and they saved it before turning off the TV and video game system. Cyborg yawned, stretched his hands upward, and then said, "That was fun. I daresay I'll be looking forward to playing that game some more tomorrow."

"I hear you man," said Beast Boy before letting out a yawn of his own that sounded very surprisingly like that of a lion. "But right now," he then said. "I'm so in need of a long good night's sleep."

Raven closed her book, yawned, and said, "For once, I agree with Beast Boy, I could certainly use some sleep."

"Agreed," said Starfire before she herself let out a yawn.

"Good idea," said Robin. "Come on everybody, let's get to bed. Hopefully we'll all be able to wake up at 8:00 am at the earliest."

The other titans were so tired that not even Beast Boy had the energy to groan and complain about the fact that Robin had set a deadline for them to wake up by.

Cyborg was the first to exit the common room, and he proceeded to make his way to his room where his inviting sleep-mode/recharging table was waiting. Raven was next to leave, and she made no hesitation to head straight to her dark and gothic themed bedroom that she still hoped that the Titans East members had had the sense to stay out of while she'd been away. Beast Boy followed close behind Raven, looking very eager indeed to curl up and sleep on the top bunk of his ever so familiar and cozy bunk bed.

For a few more seconds, Robin and Starfire remained standing where they were. Robin then turned his head to face Starfire with a smile on his face. "Good day?" he asked.

Starfire smiled back at her boyfriend, and responded, "Indeed it was Robin."

"That's good," said Robin with his smile still on his face. He stretched his arms and hands upward, yawning as he did so. "It's so nice to be home."

"Indeed," said Starfire. "As was said in that intriguing movie you once had us watch involving a wizard of some strange place called Oz, 'there's no place like home.'"

Robin chuckled, and said, "That's certainly true." He then looked back at Starfire, gestured for her to go ahead and walk alongside him out of the room before saying, "Come on Star. Let's get to bed. I have a good feeling that we'll have a pretty good day ahead of us tomorrow as well. Heck, maybe things will be relatively peaceful in Jump City for once."

Starfire smiled at the thought, linked her arm with Robin's, and smiled as she and her fearless leader and boyfriend proceeded to exit the common room of the tower, arm-in-arm, and feeling very happy at the close contact. They didn't unlink their arms until they reached Starfire's room; and as soon as Starfire entered her room and the doors to it closed behind her, Robin made his way calmly over to his room, feeling very giddy and happy with himself on the inside.

. . . . .

However, what none of the titans knew at that particular moment, was that they'd been watched for the last few hours. If either of the five teenagers had happened to look at the uppermost right corner of the window located the furthest to the right from the one that doubled as a TV screen in the time between their dinner and heading off to bed, they would have noticed what appeared to be a sea gull with unnaturally black eyes leaning its head down from where it was perched on the tower roof to look inside.

When the five teenagers had finally stopped their activities and headed off to bed one by one, the apparent sea gull waited for another few minutes or so just to make sure that no one came back into the room, appeared to let out a sigh of relief after that, and then lifted its head back up away from view from anyone who could have looked through the windows at it.

Seconds later, an unnaturally human-like and malicious grin came on the sea gull's face, and it spoke in a hollow voice, "Things are going exactly as planned . . . perfect." No sooner had the sea gull said this, when its beak suddenly snapped open and what appeared to be a powerful jet of pitch black smoke erupted from out of its mouth and into the open air before zooming off towards the forest located on a coast a few miles or so south of Jump City. The instant the last of the smoke exited the sea gull's mouth, the bird let out a croaking groan, closed its now naturally colored eyes, and plummeted over the edge of the tower roof before landing on the ground with a sickening thud.

Meanwhile, for the next few minutes, the ominous black smoke continued to rocket through the air as it made its way to its destination. It was now time for it to report to its comrades that the targets they'd been assigned to go after that very night were now ready for them to deal with.

**And there you have it everyone! I hope you guys enjoyed this (admittedly rather short) chapter, and that you leave a nice healthy bunch of reviews! And better yet, for the sake of reducing the chances of my Teen Titans fanfiction career becoming dead in the water before it can really truly begin, I've decided to stop my original policy of waiting until I receive 5 reviews before posting new chapters. But still, do not hesitate to review. I want to still at least have one review before my currently appointed day of posting a new chapter. Well anyway, again, I hope you guys enjoyed this, and that you are looking forward to the next chapter, particularly after the rather suspenseful note (in my opinion anyway) that I have left this chapter off on. ^_^**

**Coming up next: The titans get rudely awakened when they end up having to do battle with 5 very much unwelcome guests that invade the tower and turn the teenage heroes' relaxing night into a literal living nightmare from Hell.**


	5. Uninvited Guests

**Hey there people! I hope you're all prepared for more titanic awesomeness, because thanks to a polite request from veteran TT fanfiction author, TheForceIsStrongWithThisOne, I have now posted yet another chapter ^_^. In this awesome new chapter, the relaxing and peaceful night of our fab five teenage heroes is rudely transformed into a literal living nightmare from Hell when they're rudely awakened by five unexpected and very much unwelcome guests. Here's to hoping that you read, review, and enjoy!**

**A/N: Just to clear the air, I do not own Teen Titans. Also, in regard to elements contained within a dream that one of the titans is having before being rudely awakened, I do not own any elements from Disney's The Lion King either. Finally, any elements that some readers might potentially recognize from the hit TV series Supernatural are indeed borrowed more or less from that show and loosely adapted for this story (and in that regard, I apologize in advance if any inadvertent religious offense is caused by certain elements within this chapter). And now, without further ado, onward with the fic!**

**Chapter 4:**

**Uninvited Guests**

Robin was fast asleep in his room. He was sleeping quite soundly, which was not something that often happened to him due to how rarely he experienced nights in which he didn't have lingering worries, thoughts, or doubts on his mind that ended up somehow making their way into his subconscious while he was sleeping. Fortunately, this night was one of those rare nights in which he could truly sleep peacefully. And boy was he happy about it.

However, despite his current sound state of sleep, he was still more or less a light sleeper in nature. His nature of being a light sleeper was a lingering effect of his time under the tutelage of Batman. And as it would later turn out that night, it would prove very valuable indeed, for at the unexpected sound of the door to his room opening, Robin's eyes came wide open, and he quickly glanced towards the door from out of the corner of his masked eyes.

He looked towards the door in this manner just in time to see an ominous looking shape standing in the shadows directly outside his room. Robin made sure to remain perfectly still, careful not to make any noise or give any other hint that he was awake. For now, one of his biggest advantages was how, due to the obscure area of the room in which his bed was positioned combined with a small series of book shelves and other furniture as well as assorted newspaper clippings on the walls and clutter on the floor, his bed could not be seen just from looking inside the bedroom from the doorway. The other, as Robin currently suspected, was that this mysterious visitor, whatever it was, very likely didn't yet know that Robin was awake.

Seconds later, he quickly looked straight back towards the wall directly in front of his face and made a big show of pretending to snore. As he did this, he heard an ominous hollow snarling noise coming from outside his room, followed by the sound of footsteps coming inside. As Robin continued to maintain his current position in his bed and pretend that he was still asleep, he heard the sound of the footsteps coming gradually closer towards the area where he and his bed were located. The low snarling also continued at random intervals. Already, Robin had a feeling that whatever was currently inside his room uninvited was either an animal, or at least some sort of non-human.

Carefully noting this information in his mind, he continued to remain where he was, listening to the sound of the footsteps and snarling as whatever this mysterious intruder was got progressively closer and closer to him. When the footsteps started sounding particularly loud as if they were in very close proximity to where he was and the snarling took on a tone that seemed slightly happy, Robin deduced that the intruder was now not too far away from him.

What seemed to be exactly one minute later, Robin soon sensed in what could only truly be purely animal instinct that the mysterious intruder was now just a few steps away from being right next to his bed and in position to strike if it planned to attack. This same instinctive feeling he now had also got him to realize that the intruder would likely be at the opportune position to strike at him in his apparent sleep in just five more steps.

Careful not to show any sign to the intruder that he was awake and aware of its presence, Robin carefully grabbed onto the handle of one of his nunchucks. Just like his nature of being a light sleeper, he had been carefully conditioned to always keep a weapon at hand while sleeping, and he found himself once again silently giving a grudging thanks to Batman for teaching him this valuable lesson, for ever since leaving Gotham City, he'd always worn his utility belt in his sleep as well as everywhere else he went. And at the same time he grabbed onto his weapon, Robin carefully tensed himself slightly so that he'd be ready to lunge at the intruder when the time was right.

Robin heard the mysterious intruder let out one last snarl, and then he heard it make the last few footsteps necessary for it to reach the opportune position of attack. The instant Robin heard the sound of the 5th footstep, he abruptly leaped from his bed straight towards the intruder with his nunchuck raised, letting out a piercing yell.

Robin just had time to clearly see a pair of astonishingly blue eyes widen in surprise before he slammed his nunchuck across the mysterious being's face and sent it stumbling backwards away from him and his bed. Mere seconds after Robin's feet touched the floor, he threw a smoke pellet at it. The smoke pellet landed on the floor right in front of it and exploded into a massive cloud of dark gray smoke, obscuring it from view, and him from its view.

As Robin heard the mysterious intruder he'd just now momentarily subdued coughing and snarling within the smoky cloud, the boy wonder quickly ran out of his room. The instant Robin left his room, he hurriedly ran down the corridor in the direction that would lead towards the common room, and coincidentally to the two sub-floors beneath him where Starfire and Cyborg's rooms were located. Upon remembering this detail, Robin hurriedly increased his pace. Even as he eventually heard the sound of what appeared to be a furious roar coming from within his room, he still had one single very important thought on his mind, "I've gotta warn the others." And indeed he was very certain that he needed to call them up and warn them, for he had a feeling that he wasn't the only one to have received an unwelcome guest in his bedroom.

. . . . .

Cyborg wasn't entirely certain just how long he'd been in sleep mode before he suddenly heard a strange voice none too different from the kind he'd often heard coming from computers and other relatively high-intelligence machines state in a rather urgent tone, "Intruder alert. Intruder alert. Emergency activation initiated."

Seconds later, Cyborg's eyes abruptly opened just in time for him to see a large black figure with equally pitch black eyes standing right at the foot of his bed with what appeared to be clawed hands raised up to strike at him. At the sight of this, Cyborg screamed in fright. The intruder also appeared to have been surprised by Cyborg's unexpectedly waking up, because it also let out an inhuman shriek of shock and stumbled backwards.

Barely giving himself any time to recover from his shock, Cyborg quickly activated his sonic cannon, pointed it at the intruder, and fired at it. The blue blast of sonic energy crashed into the being's chest and sent it crashing into the wall directly across from the foot of Cyborg's bed.

No sooner had the mysterious intruder slumped down slightly upon impact with the wall, when Cyborg jumped out of his bed and ran out of his room, quickly making his way towards the common room while at the same time working to activate the video-phone communicator built into his right arm. "I've got to warn the others," Cyborg thought. "I have a feeling that whatever that thing was brought friends along."

. . . . .

Raven wasn't entirely certain how she managed to sense the intruder inside her room walking up towards her bed, much less how it had ended up happening while she was asleep. Perhaps maybe it was just her naturally being wary of others entering her room without her permission. Maybe it was a result of her past experiences of times in which she'd gotten terrified in her own room. Or maybe it was some sort of demonic danger sensing ability she had as a result of her demonic heritage. But whatever it was, she was glad she had it, because she had a very bad feeling, practically instinctive, that whatever was now inside her room heading towards her was not Beast Boy or any of the other titans attempting to play a joke on her, much less someone friendly.

After what seemed like an eternity to Raven, she sensed that the being was now just a few footsteps or so from her bed, and she quietly whispered, "Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos," before abruptly sitting up in her bed and firing a blast of shadowy energy at the intruder.

The intruder's blinding yellow eyes widened in shock, and it let out a surprised howl at the unexpected sight of Raven sitting up in her bed awake in combination with getting hit by her umbrakinetic blast. The impact of the blast sent it flying backward before it landed directly outside her room. Unfortunately, it landed on its feet, and looked straight at her before growling, and lifting its clawed hands so that its fingers pointed at Raven. At the sight of the electricity that soon started crackling on the mysterious being's clawed fingers, Raven quickly yelled out her mantra again, and sank into a vortex of shadows that opened up directly underneath her and closed the instant she'd completely entered it seconds before the maelstrom of lightning bolts that leaped out from the intruders clawed fingertips struck the bed right where she'd been sitting.

And even as Raven hurtled through the shadowy emptiness she now found herself in as she hurriedly attempted to somehow manage to exit from it into the common room, she thought to herself, "The others, I have to find them. If that thing was what I think it was, it didn't come alone."

. . . . .

Beast Boy had been in the middle of a pleasant dream in which he was racing alongside the adult versions of Simba and Nala in his lion form when he suddenly heard a deep bestial voice from behind him growl, "Wake up."

Stunned, Beast Boy positioned himself so that he came skidding to a stop. The dream versions of Simba and Nala continued running far ahead of him, and he turned his head to look behind him. His lion eyes widened in shock at the unexpected sight before him. Standing right there about a foot or so behind him, was the Beast; the very same primal monster that he had first ended up being capable of turning into after the first time he and the other titans had battled against Adonis and now only used as a last resort, a case in point being when Trigon's army of demons had attacked the tower on the night Raven had been destined to become the portal that would allow Trigon to come to Earth in his demon form.

"What the?" Beast Boy yelled in what could have qualified as telepathy. "How did you . . . ? What are you doing in my dream!?"

"Wake up!" the Beast roared. "There is danger lurking inside your lair right this very moment while you sleep. Wake up and defend yourself!"

"Danger?" Beast Boy asked in shock. "In my room? What do you mean?"

The Beast growled in exasperation, and abruptly leaned forward so that its face was mere centimeters away from Beast Boy's own face and savagely roared, "I SAID WAKE UP!"

Beast Boy's eyes snapped open instantaneously after this, and he rocketed up into a seated position on his top bunk, shrieking in shock.

At the sound of an inhuman howl of shock coming from the area around where his bottom bunk was located, Beast Boy turned his head. His eyes widened as he saw that the Beast hadn't been kidding when it had told him that there was danger right there in his room. Standing not too far away now from his bunk bed was an unfamiliar and threatening looking figure. The darkness within the room combined with Beast Boy having still not yet quite gotten his full bearings back yet made it hard for him to make out just what the being looked like, but he could definitely clearly see a pair of blazing red eyes widened in shock at the sight of him awake.

Before Beast Boy could have a chance to make note of any other distinguishing features, the eyes soon narrowed, and he heard the intruder snarl before he saw it draw its right arm back as if about to throw something, and then thrusted it forward, sending a large ball of fire flying from its hand.

Beast Boy quickly turned into a hummingbird and flew out of the way just in time to avoid getting roasted alive by the flaming projectile, which crashed right onto the top of the wall his bunk bed was positioned directly next to. Beast Boy quickly hovered down towards the being, and then turned into a bighorn sheep right as he was about a few inches away from it.

With a gravelly bleating noise, he slammed into the intruder, horns first and sent it crashing onto its back. No sooner had he knocked the mysterious unwelcome guest onto its back when he proceeded to bound out of his room, still in bighorn sheep form. He skidded to a halt in a way that allowed him to turn to face the direction that he could run down to get to the common room, and then hurriedly bounded down the corridor, turning into a cheetah after reaching the end of the immediate corridor and letting out a snarl of exertion before running off to the right to run down the path leading down to where Raven's room was located, and from there past the restroom sub-floor and all the way to the common room.

"I've gotta find the others," he thought to himself in his cheetah form. "I have to find them! I have to warn them about that crazy intruder!" Then another thought popped up in his head as he ended up having to abruptly skid across the floor on his side to slide under a large slew of horizontal lightning bolts coming out of the entrance to Raven's room as he was running down the corridor that particular room was located on. "Oh great! It has friends! Oh God, I hope Raven's ok."

. . . . .

Starfire slept very soundly and peacefully with a smile on her face for almost an entire hour before she abruptly heard a piercing "EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

Starfire bolted up in her bed awake, letting out a shriek that would have given even a banshee nightmares. She barely had time to even begin processing what had just happened or calming her now very quick breathing or rapidly pounding heart before she heard a surprised inhuman growl coming from directly to her left.

She flicked her head in the direction she'd heard the growl coming from just in time to see a scaly green bipedal figure awkwardly stumbling backward on its right leg, its equally verdant green eyes widened in shock, and its left draconic foot lifted up in the air as if it had just recently lifted it back up after accidentally stepping on something.

Right as Starfire noticed that particular detail, she briefly directed a slight glance down towards the floor between her and the intruder in time to see Silkie's tail disappear underneath her bed. Silkie had been sleeping right on the floor next to her bed from that side, and it now appeared to Starfire that the intruder had accidentally stepped on him while making its way towards Starfire, causing him to wake up and unleash the ungodly screaming noise that had now woken her up.

All this happened in about ten seconds before she abruptly remembered the intruder, and let out a belated scream of fright before hurriedly blasting a star bolt at it. The bright green energy blast hit the intruder in the chest with a bang, sending it slamming hard into the wall directly across from the door to her room. Breathing rapidly, she took to the air and flew out of her room.

No sooner had she left her room and started rapidly looking to her left and right as if trying to decide where to go when she heard Robin's voice to her right yell, "Starfire!"

She looked to her right just in time to see Robin running straight towards her and then jump in the air towards her just in time to avoid a forceful jet of water that abruptly came from around the corner of a wall that separated her room from the upwards ramp corridor leading up to where his own room was located and blasted the floor right where he'd been before jumping.

Starfire almost reflexively extended her hands, and Robin grabbed onto them. Having thus taken their favored position when flying together, Starfire hurriedly flew down the opposite direction leading to the ramp corridor heading downwards to where Cyborg's room was located and from there to a nearby side entrance to the common room with Robin tightly clutching her hands. Almost immediately after the flying couple rounded the corner that bordered with the downwards ramp corridor leading down to the sub-floor division where Cyborg's room was located, jets of water and massive clouds of what looked like vivid green poisonous gas came pouring from the hallway they'd just left and pounded into the wall.

As Starfire continued to hurriedly fly through the corridors while carrying Robin, she fearfully asked, "Robin, what's going on? What are these nasty things in our home?"

"I don't know," Robin responded, "but whatever they are, we need to find the others and warn them, because judging from how both of us have ended getting visited by one of those things, the others probably had their own unwelcome guests in their rooms as well . . . look out!"

Starfire looked in front of her, and shrieked as she saw a massive ball of shadowy energy hurtling straight towards her. She swooped downward and the sphere of shadows crashed harmlessly into the ceiling. Terrified, she let her eye beams fly out towards the area in front of her. By sheer luck, the lasers she'd just fired from her eyes blasted the dark black figure that had tossed the shadow ball at her right in the chest, sending it flying backward and crashing right into the wall at the opposite end of the hallway where Cyborg's room was located.

The intruder Starfire blasted happened to zoom near enough in proximity to the common room doors within that hallway while careening backwards for the doors in question to open up and reveal that the lights were now on in that room. Robin pointed at the doors and yelled, "Quick, let's get inside the common room! I think the others might be there!"

Starfire didn't need to be told twice, and she soared straight through the doors and into the common room. Seconds after that, Starfire let go of Robin and he landed on his feet while turning the impact into a series of somersaults before Starfire herself flew up slightly higher so that she was hovering a few inches or so above Robin and the other three titans, who she could now see standing nearby the back of the sofa in what appeared to be battle-ready positions.

At the sight of Robin and Starfire now inside the room alongside him, Beast Boy, and Raven, Cyborg said, "I'm guessing you've also now met the unexpected guests?"

"Yes," Robin responded.

"Well good thing you and Star are here with us now," said Raven.

"Yeah," said Beast Boy. "Whatever these things are, they're definitely here to attack us, and this room's as good of a place to make a stand against them as we are likely going to get at the moment."

Seconds later, the titans heard what sounded like crashing noises coming from the walls, and they looked upwards just in time to see the two air vent covers, one at the top central area of the left wall and the other at the top central area of the right wall, come popping off of their respective air vents and come crashing down on the floor. At the same time the air vent covers came popping off, five ominous looking jets of smoke came rocketing out from them. The two jets of smoke pouring out of the left air vent were yellow and red, and the three smoke jets billowing out of the right air vent were blue, green, and black.

Seconds after the tail ends of the smoke streams had exited the air vents, the five smoke jets swirled around in the air before abruptly taking a nosedive straight down towards the floor. The five smoke jets all came crashing down on the floor in random areas a couple feet in front of each of the five teenage heroes before then seeming to solidify and taking on a more corporeal shape, revealing themselves to in fact be the same five mysterious intruders that had come into the titans' bed rooms and attempted to strike at them in their sleep.

. . . . .

Now that the titans were both in a room with the lights on and had sufficient time, they were able to get a much better look at the five intruders. The five beings now standing before them that had only minutes ago attempted to very likely kill them in their sleep looked very much like wingless bipedal humanoid dragons. In fact, since their bodily shape, complete with the tails, fangs, claws, scaly skin, and other draconic features seemed almost exactly alike in each of the five intruders, the only ways that the titans could tell them apart were the blaringly obvious differences in the color of their scales and eyes, the shape of their tails, and the way their heads were adorned.

The intruder that had been in Robin's room and was now standing in front of the boy wonder had icy blue scales, sapphire blue eyes, a fish-like tail, and a pair of straight vertical needle shaped horns on its head. The creature that Cyborg had encountered and was now standing in front of him had midnight black scales, bull-like horns on its head, a small mane of jet black fur around its neck, a tuft of black fur at the tip of its tail, and a pair of pitch black eyes that were so dark that they looked as if they were pupil-less. The being that had dared enter Raven's room and was now standing in front of her had golden yellow scales, topaz yellow eyes, a pair of lightning bolt shaped horns on its head, and a spiked tail that closely resembled the kind typically found on a stegosaurus or similar spike-tailed dinosaur. The draconic home invader that Beast Boy had dealt with had blood red scales, ruby red eyes, a ring of horns around its neck in a style reminiscent of a lion's mane, and a long tail with an arrowhead shaped spike at the end. Finally, the monster that had invaded Starfire's room and was standing on the floor area in front of her had venomous green scales, emerald green eyes, a barbed tail that closely resembled that of a scorpion, a straight row of scythe-shaped spikes lined across the top of its head in a mohawk-like style, and a verdant green frill around its neck. And as Starfire and the other titans watched, the green scaled intruder extended its frill to full length and hissed maliciously at Starfire, revealing a long forked tongue.

Starfire gulped in fear at the sight of the intimidating display of aggression from the creature. "Robin?" she asked fearfully. "What are these things?"

"No idea," Robin admitted. "But whatever they are," he said as he proceeded to ram his right fist into his left palm in an almost anticipatory for battle gesture, "they're not going to get away with this little home invasion without going through us."

Seconds after Robin said this, he and the other titans were very surprised when the five humanoid dragon figures let sickening grins come on their faces. The green scaled one then started hissing again, but this time in a tone that sounded similar to laughter. "How foolish," it then said in a raspy voice that sounded very much like the way Beast Boy himself would have definitely expected a snake to sound like if snakes could talk. "That little bird thinks he stands a chance against us, I can't tell whether or not to feel respect for his bravery or laugh at his stupidity."

The blue scaled being then chuckled in agreement, and stated, "Indeed, and it certainly doesn't help how even after all he and his friends have gone through and encountered, they still don't even know what we are."

The red scaled monster let out a harsh laugh, and said, "You'd think that at least one of them would have known, especially the shadow girl considering how half her blood comes from one of our kin!"

At the sight of this, Raven cursed silently to herself in her mind. It seemed that her earlier suspicions had just now been proven true.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa," said Beast Boy. He pointed at the red scaled being, and then stated, "Half her blood comes from one of _your_ kin? I thought she was half demon?"

The yellow scaled creature laughed, and condescendingly hissed, "Oh indeed she is changeling."

"Hold on," said Robin as he proceeded to point at the five beings as well. "You're saying that you guys are demons?"

"At last," said the black scaled being in a tone that sounded prideful. "A modicum of intelligence."

"Oh come on!" shouted Cyborg. "You expect us to believe that?"

The five draconic figures directed stern glares at the half robot teenager. "And why would you not?" they asked in unison.

"Because we've fought _real_ demons before," said Cyborg as he proceeded to point at the five intruders. "And you guys don't look like any demons I've ever seen!"

The five intruders raised their eyebrows in confusion. Then the black one proceeded to gaze very intently at Cyborg, its black eyes seeming to turn even darker if that was possible. Then its eyes turned back to its normal shade of still rather dark black, and it grinned before saying, "Oh that's right; you're referring to those fiery disgraces you battled when Trigon attempted to overthrow your entire universe."

Cyborg's human eye, and the eyes of the four completely biological based titans widened upon hearing this information. "How did you know about that?" Raven asked, though she had a feeling she knew.

The black scaled being chuckled, directed its gaze at Raven and said, "Your friend's mind may be partially inorganic, but it is not immune to mind reading, least of all the kind that me and my kin possess."

"You read my mind!?" Cyborg yelled.

"Oh yes I did, Victor Stone!"

At the sound of that name, Cyborg looked as if he'd just been punched in the gut. "My . . . my civilian name . . ."

"That's right!" yelled the black scaled being. "Even your biggest secrets cannot be hidden indefinitely from a demon who's willing to dig deep enough!" No sooner had he said this when he and his four compatriots started laughing maliciously again. The five titans looked each other in the eyes nervously. It seemed that the five intruders were very likely telling the truth about what they were.

"But enough of the mind reading business," said the black demon. "Back on your doubts, even after your experiences with Trigon and his army, surely you didn't think that those demons and all the demons from every other religion out there were one and the same, did you?"

At the sound of this, Robin and the other titans apart from Raven looked at each other awkwardly.

The five beings chuckled, and then the blue being said, "Well regardless, you may have been able to handle the denizens of the Azarathian form of Hell, but with us, you're now dealing with a completely different kind of threat!

"Yeah," yelled the red creature. "Move over those big shot wannabes you fought during Trigon's pathetic attempt at the apocalypse! You're now dealing with the demons of the Abrahamic faith, the fallen humanity that haunts the Jews, Christians, and Islamics, the followers of Lucifer himself!" Upon finishing this little bout of bragging, the red demon and its four compatriots laughed once more.

Robin glared at the five laughing demons. He was now beginning to get seriously angered by how they were now laughing at him and his friends once again. He pointed at them and growled, "Well you may be a kind of enemy we're not entirely familiar with, but we're still going to take you down and send you right back to Hell!"

The yellow demon chuckled, licked its lips hungrily, and then said, "Very brave words, but I'm afraid you are very much wrong. You and your pathetic friends may have been lucky enough to awaken in time to prevent us from mercifully killing you in your sleep, but you have only prolonged the inevitable. And by the end of this night, all five of you will be dead; and not only will it be slow and painful now, but it will also be done without us even needing to possess you and cause you to deal fatal injuries to yourself that will cause you to die within seconds after we abandon your bodies!"

The demons laughed again, and then leaned forward as one in apparent battle stance. "Attack," the blue demon hissed. In a flash, the five demons rushed towards the five teenage heroes with Hellish roars bursting from their throats.

"Titans go!" Robin yelled as he and the other titans leaped out of the way of the charging demons. The demons crashed into the sofa with such an impact that they went flying over the sofa and towards the windows in front of it. But before the demons could crash into the windows, which the titans had actually been expecting, the demons abruptly turned back into their smoke forms and rocketed back at them before coming to another crash landing in front of them and solidifying once again.

The demons growled, and pointed their hands at them, their claws now starting to tingle with their own respective elemental energies. "Split up!" Robin yelled, and the titans each leaped away in different directions in time to avoid the blasts of elemental energy the demons fired from their hands at them.

"Spread out!" the blue demon yelled after it and its brethren had finished their failed attempt at blasting the titans. The five demons promptly began pursuing their own apparent targets of choice.

Robin carefully noted this detail in his mind. "Looks like blue boy's the leader," he thought to himself before he jumped off of his perch on the super computer counter top to avoid the water jet the blue demon spouted at him from its hands. It seemed like only seconds passed after Robin landed from his jumping escape before he then had to somersault to his left to avoid a second spout of water, cartwheel backwards to his right to avoid getting skewered by a gigantic icicle that rose up from the floor in direct response to the demon slamming it's right fist on the floor, and then jump backwards again with a back flip to avoid a gust of icy wind that the demon caused to spin around the area directly surrounding it. "And he's certainly tough enough to be worthy of that position," he thought to himself.

Meanwhile, Cyborg found himself using his sonic cannon quite often as he continuously blasted the orbs and jets of shadow energy that the black demon threw at him again and again. And not only did Cyborg have to deal with the shadowy energy blasts that the demon summoned, but also from abrupt attacks that the demon pulled off in which it melted into the shadows and then abruptly seemed to materialize out of nowhere in a flash of shadows and attempt to strike at Cyborg.

"Good grief," Cyborg yelled as he ended up narrowly dodging a fifth such sneak attack from his shadowy assailant. "I am so glad that I'm on the same side as you Raven, because I now have a feeling that I now know exactly what it would be like to battle against you as an enemy!"

"Good to know," Raven growled as she remained where she currently was and put in as much effort as she could muster to keep the force field she currently had deployed around herself fully functional under the merciless barrage of lightning bolts that the yellow demon attacking her fired at her from its clawed fingertips.

She grunted from the exertion. While she certainly doubted that she would readily admit this to anyone who happened to comment on it now or later, she couldn't deny that against this particular type of demon, she was at a severe disadvantage. Due to her naturally shadow-oriented abilities, she had a natural weakness against light-based attacks. However, out of all the kinds of light-based attacks in existence, she was dangerously susceptible to electricity. Even the weakest electrical shock was enough to put her at risk of severe burns and draining of her energy.

And now, against this horrific electrokinetic demon, she found herself truly fighting one of her most potentially life-threatening battles ever. Not only were the beams of electricity it fired and bolts it summoned capable of ripping her shadowy energy blasts to shreds as if they were paper, but the ones that she was lucky enough to successfully strike it with didn't seem to cause any damage high enough to even wound it, much less kill it. In fact, whenever she was lucky to succeed in striking the thunder demon with one of her energy blasts, it only laughed, and sometimes even condescendingly asked her if she'd truly expected her blasts to hurt it. And her telekinetic skills didn't seem to do any better, for no matter what she tried to throw at it, the demon would almost contemptuously blast whatever object she'd thrown at it into dust before it got even remotely close. Of course, taking a defensive strategy now didn't seem any easier. Even now Raven was fighting to keep herself from losing her focus on keeping her shield up in light of her rapidly draining energy. And the demon seemed to know how weak she was getting because it was now chuckling maliciously like a mad man as it continued to increase the intensity of the bolts it was currently firing at her.

Beast Boy was also having a difficult time fighting against the fiery red demon he was currently doing battle with. Every time he'd attempted to get close enough to it to attack, he'd ended up forced to jump away as a result of his assailant shooting fire at him. And at the current moment, as the demon continued to throw more fireballs and jets of flames at him, the green shape shifter found himself with now choice but to continue to run, jump, and fly in his desperate race to continue to avoid getting blasted by the fire.

"Good grief," he yelled in his mind as he turned into a peregrine falcon and flew up higher towards the ceiling to avoid yet another jet of flames. "Is there anything I can do hurt this guy?"

Meanwhile, Starfire at first was able to hold her own against her assailant slightly more easily than her companions as she found it more or less easy to dodge the boulders and streams of acid it shot at her, and the small shockwaves it had proven itself capable of creating held no fear to her since they only seemed able to harm anything within their area of effect if the object in question was on the floor.

Unfortunately for Starfire, the verdant green poison demon had changed tactics a few minutes later, and was now appearing to summon a large mass of poisonous gas that concentrated in the air directly surrounding Starfire, and it followed her no matter where she flew. And even worse, it seemed that this type of gas was indeed capable of effecting her, because she soon found herself coughing and struggling to stay awake in spite of the fumes she was inhaling. She was so busy trying not to pass out, that she didn't even notice the poison demon start to climb up the wall she was now hovering next to like a gecko.

A few minutes later, the poison gas abruptly vanished. Before Starfire could fully process this information, she was taken completely by surprise when she felt a clawed hand come from out of nowhere to her left and clench tightly around her throat. She managed to look in the direction the hand appeared to have come from and saw the maliciously grinning face of the poison demon staring back at her. The demon chuckled, extended its forked tongue towards her face mockingly, and hissed, "Lights out Starfire," before positioning its barbed tail, which now appeared to have acidic venom bubbling up at the tip, as if about to stab her with it.

Fortunately for Starfire, Robin just happened to glance in her direction from out of the corner of his eye in time. "NO!" Robin roared before hurling one of his fire disks at the poison demon so fast and hard that it would have probably hit the creature with enough force to break its back if it hadn't been designed to explode. And explode it indeed did. The instant the disk so much as touched the demon's back, it exploded in a fantastic burst of flames.

"OOOOWWWW!" The demon roared in agony, and fell backwards off of the wall, letting go of Starfire in the process. Starfire also fell, still feeling relatively weak from the poisonous gas she'd inhaled in combination with the choking grip the demon had gripped her throat with. Fortunately, Robin quickly threw a freeze disk at the water demon he was battling to keep it busy, and then leaped through the air towards where Starfire was falling. The freeze disk crashed right into the force field of water that the water demon summoned around itself in a reflexive defense move and the resulting blast of frosty air caused the water shield to freeze solid, leaving the water demon trapped inside an icy dome.

Right as Starfire was seconds away from landing hard on the floor, Robin reached the area she was heading towards in time to catch her valiantly in his arms and then acrobatically position himself so that he absorbed the majority of the impact from landing on the floor afterward, shielding Starfire from suffering further damage.

The poison demon that had been attacking Starfire was not so lucky, and it crash landed hard on the floor, right on its back, which was now horribly burned as a result of Robin's explosive disk. It landed so hard that the acid that had bubbled up on its tail went flying into the air before landing right on top of the thunder demon's left foot.

The thunder demon hissed in pain, and it shut off the electricity spouting from its claws at Raven as it proceeded to start hopping up and down on one foot in pain. Growling it turned its head towards the poison demon and shouted, "Watch where you drop that stuff you fool!"

"Sorry," the poison demon groaned as it proceeded to get on its hands and knees and try to get up. "Ow," it whimpered as the motion caused waves of pain to flare up across his back.

Raven, seeing the distraction, briefly lowered her shield, and happened to notice Beast Boy hovering tiredly in the air in his falcon form. The fire demon he'd been battling was standing right below him about to shoot another fiery blast at him.

In a flash, with her assailant distracted, Raven summoned a shadowy hemisphere that engulfed Beast Boy and spirited him away in time to let him avoid getting blasted by the fire demon's blast. Another dark hemisphere appeared to her right and faded away to reveal Beast Boy in his falcon form. Beast Boy shifted back, and panted briefly before saying, "Thanks, I really owe you one now."

"You're welcome," Raven gasped, relieved to have saved her friend and to have managed to get a brief respite from the thunder demon's murderous attacks against her.

"What the Devil?"

Upon hearing the thunder demon's surprised voice, Beast Boy turned into a polar bear, roared as he turned to face it, and then slapped it right in the face with his huge right front paw.

The thunder demon was sent flying through the air and it crashed right into the shadow demon just as it was about to hurl another orb of shadow energy at Cyborg, resulting in the two demons collapsing onto the floor and the shadow orb rocketing off in the direction opposite the one the shadow demon had originally intended to throw it.

This direction just happened to be towards the water demon, who had just now managed to bust out of the icy prison Robin had managed to trap it in. Upon shattering the walls of the icy dome, it happened to look in the direction of the shadow ball, and its brilliant blue eyes widened in surprise and what Robin could have sworn was fear. Hissing in shock and apparent fear, the water demon lunged forward just in time to avoid getting blasted by the shadow demon's errant shadow ball, which crashed into the floor where it had been standing and blew the small circular base that remained of the icy dome to smithereens.

Soon after the water demon got back on its feet, it glared at the shadow demon and indignantly growled, "Watch where you're throwing those things you idiot!"

"Sorry," the shadow demon groaned weakly as it continued to struggle to get itself out from under the dazed thunder demon lying on top of it.

The water demon growled as it saw how the thunder and shadow demons were now momentarily incapacitated, growled again when it noticed the poison demon still lying on its belly groaning in pain, and then growled a third time when it saw the fire demon looking around in confusion as if trying to decide or remember what it was supposed to be doing at the moment.

"Enough with this!" The water demon roared. "Get your sorry acts together so we can finish the. . ." It turned its head to face the area where Robin and Starfire were right as it was about to finish that sentence, only to unexpectedly feel something sharp abruptly crash and jab into its neck.

While the water demon had been looking away from Robin as it yelled at its underlings, Robin had thrown one of his birdirangs at it, with full intention of attempting to kill it. And as a result, when the demon finally turned its head back to face Robin, the 'beak' end of the device had jammed point-first into the demon's throat like a knife.

For a brief moment, the demon had an expression of shock on its face. But then its eyes narrowed as if in disappointment, it shook his head with a half annoyed and half disappointed glare on its face, and then calmly directed its eyes downward towards the projectile sticking out of its throat. Seconds later, much to the shock and slight horror of the titans, the water demon calmly reached up and slowly pulled the birdirang out of its throat. The small hole left behind in the demon's neck almost instantly closed up afterward without leaving any signs of there having ever been a wound there in the first place.

As the titans watched in shock, the water demon glared at them and proceeded to derisively hiss, "Did you seriously expect a mundane human weapon, much less a toy like this . . ." it gestured at the birdirang it was now clutching in its hand, "to be capable of killing something like me or others of my kin?" The demon then proceeded to clench its hand that held the birdirang into a fist, crushing the birdirang like a bug. Robin gulped, and he and Starfire looked into each other's eyes nervously. It was now very much seeming that the titans were potentially in way over their heads in this situation.

The water demon growled, and then furiously roared, "You dare to mock me and my kin by being so insulting as to futilely attempt to kill me with something as insignificant as a toy?! We may be demons, but we deserve to die in much better ways than ones as ignominious as the one you have just now dared to tease me with!"

The demon growled, pointed its clawed finger at each of the five titans, and then said, "We have been going easy on you so far, but now that you have chosen to insult us the way you have now done with that pathetic toy, the gloves are off." The demon shouted out to its fellow demons in the room, "Comrades! Gather to me!"

One by one, the other four demons ran over to their leader and took positions by its side. The poison demon was the first to decide to make its way back to the water demon, and it slowly got back on its feet, hissing and wheezing in pain from the burns on its back before then slowly walking over to its leader, flinching and cringing in pain as it walked. Upon seeing its compatriot join up with its leader, the fire demon hurriedly rushed over to take a position by its leader's side. The thunder demon soon got off the shadow demon and back on its feet, still slightly dazed, and then limped over to join up with its fellow demons. It was clear that it was still feeling pain from the acid that had landed on its foot. The shadow demon was the last demon to join up with its comrades, and it didn't take long at all to get back on its feet and obediently march over to join its fellow demons.

No sooner had the five demons regrouped together when the water demon pointed at Robin and growled, "You and your team mates shall now regroup together near that large door near the back of the room. I want this battle to be done properly all the way from the beginning."

Four of the titans glowered and looked as if they were about to resist. Fortunately, they all managed to see Robin gesture with his head for them not to do so, and then mouth to them 'I have a plan.' The other titans raised their eyebrows, but then looked at each other, and then looked back at Robin before nodding that they understood. After all, their fearless leader had rarely ever failed them before when he made his plans for defeating the enemies they fought in the past. Besides, they knew that if this current plan Robin had formed up worked, then their potentially wounded pride at playing along with the demons' games for the moment would be a small price to pay for victory.

The titans quickly proceeded to gather together two meters or so opposite from the five demons. In a flash, right as the demons proceeded to position themselves as if they were gathering their strength and composure, Robin whispered to the other titans, "Alright team, do you have any abilities or skills you know of that you could use to possibly deflect any of the demons' elemental attacks in opposite directions from us?"

The other titans thought to themselves. "Well," said Starfire, "I think that if I were flying and happened to continuously kick quickly enough, I could potentially deflect the flames that the red creature uses in its attacks."

"Alright Star, that should work nicely," said Robin. He looked at the other titans and whispered, "What about you guys?"

"I could potentially whip any one of those blasts away with my tail as an ankylosaur or stegosaur," said Beast Boy. "But it would probably be more reliable for me to turn into a Galapagos tortoise and using my shell to redirect the water jets."

"I think I have just enough strength to create a shield strong enough to redirect the shadow blasts that the black demon conjures," said Raven.

"I still haven't yet used those shield extensions I had installed back in Tokyo," said Cyborg. "If they're truly as sturdy and strong as the guy who installed them said they were, then I could likely deflect all of those different elemental blasts those demons use, including the acid."

"Good to know," said Robin. He drew out his bo staff, allowed it to extend to full length, and then said, "With my staff, it should be easy enough for me to deflect those lightning bolts."

"Mind if I ask what exactly you're planning for us to do?" Raven asked.

"Starfire," Robin said. "Did you notice how much the fire from my exploding disk seemed to hurt the poison demon that I saved you from?"

"Yes," said Starfire.

"Raven," Robin said. "Remember how that thunder demon reacted when the acid from the poison demon landed on its foot?"

Raven nodded her head. Beast Boy also nodded, for he'd managed to see this while still in the air as a falcon.

"Cyborg," said Robin. "Did you see how quickly the water demon was to dodge that shadow blast that got knocked towards it? Or better yet, did you see the look on its face when it saw the shadow blast heading towards it?"

"I did see how quick it was in dodging it," said Cyborg. "But I didn't get a close look at its face."

"It was afraid of it," said Robin. "And with all that in mind, plus the knowledge of how water is an almost universal method of extinguishing fires and the relative similarities between the natures and abilities of Raven and that shadow demon, I think that we might be able to defeat them more easily if we could somehow manage to get them blasted in the crossfire of their own elemental attacks."

The other titans considered what Robin had said, and then smiled and nodded as they realized that their leader's plan actually made sense. Robin smiled upon noticing this, and then said, "When those demons resume their attacks on us, try to get whatever demon you pick to focus on and fire at you. When we're all positioned just right, I'll give the signal, and then we all need to let the demons' elemental blasts come close enough to you without dodging so that you can reflect them at the demon that's weakest against each respective elemental attack. Got that?" The other titans nodded and smirked, for they indeed understood and were now ready for action.

Seconds later, they heard the blue demon yell, "Now my brethren! Attack!" With a roar of challenge, the five demons bolted straight towards their targets once more.

"Titans move!" Robin yelled, and the five teenage heroes leaped in different directions and proceeded to initiate their newly formulated plan.

For the next few minutes, the demons fired their elemental blasts randomly again and again, now not seeming to care that some of them were now no longer firing at their original targets from earlier. Meanwhile, the titans continuously dodged and likewise evaded the attacks as they slowly got themselves and their attackers positioned for the trap the titans were now setting for the demons. And as the demons continued their efforts to kill their targets, they were now so angry and single-mindedly focused on their efforts that they didn't even notice how their targets were slowly but surely leading them straight into a trap.

"Come on," Robin thought to himself as he and the other titans continued to get themselves and their attackers slowly into position. "Almost, almost, any moment now."

Seconds later, when Robin, the other titans, and the demons were all in what Robin instinctively knew were the right positions for his plan, he yelled, "Now!"

Coincidentally, the demons all chose to attack at that exact moment. The thunder demon snarled, and sent bolts of lightning flying from its clawed finger tips at Robin. The shadow demon fired a massive burst of flame-shaped shadowy energy at Raven. The water demon sent a forceful spout of water from its hands at Beast Boy. The fire demon unleashed a brilliant jet of flames flying up towards Starfire. And finally, the poison demon caused a large stream of corrosive acid to spray from its hands towards Cyborg.

In that instant, the five demons caused their own downfall. Seconds before the lightning bolts being fired at Robin could touch him, the boy wonder started rapidly spinning his bo staff around clockwise like a stereotypical martial arts master, deflecting the beams of electricity to his right and causing them to spear the shadow demon in the back. At the same time the thunder demon's electricity struck the shadow demon, the shadow demon's own burst of shadow energy was reflected to the right off of Raven's own shadowy shield where it ended up smashing into the back of the water demon.

The leader among the five demons attempting to kill the titans fared no better in its efforts to blast the titan it was attempting to blast, for Beast Boy turned into a Galapagos tortoise and curled up into his shell just in time for the demon's water jet to pound onto the top of the shell and cause the shelled up tortoise to be pushed up into a position allowing it to be leaning against the counter that doubled as a table. As a result of how Beast Boy the tortoise was now positioned, the water demon's water spout ended up being reflected to the right off of Beast Boy's shell and splashing onto the back of the fire demon.

And of course, at the exact same moment that the water demon's attack was sent crashing into the back of the fire demon, Starfire ended up continuously kicking at the tip of the fiery jet heading towards her so quickly that she caused it to be deflected downwards to her right, where it plowed into the already hideously burned back of the poison demon, whose own jet of acid was sent flying to the right as a result of slamming into Cyborg's newly extended and artfully positioned arm shield extensions so that it forcefully splashed onto the back of the thunder demon.

The five demons howled in shock and pain as they felt themselves getting unexpectedly blasted in the back by their own comrades' attacks, and they hurriedly tried to shut off their attacks. Unfortunately for them, in a cruel paradox, instead of the pain causing them to lose the focus needed to maintain their elemental attacks, the pain proved so distracting to them that they were unable to focus clearly enough to shut off their currently active elemental blasts. And so, the five demons now found themselves hopelessly trapped in a web of their own elemental powers, completely helpless to escape or shut down the same powers they'd hoped to kill their targets with that were now causing their own demise instead.

After about a minute, the demons suddenly started jerking and vibrating in pain as they suddenly appeared to become engulfed in electricity that matched their respective scale colors and their eyes flashed with color complimentary lights on and off. But even though this caught the titans by surprise, they continued to keep their current deflection mechanisms they were using active, not daring to break the now perfectly functioning trap that they'd set against their would-be killers. For the next few minutes, the demons continued to jerk and writhe and hiss in pain as the electricity and lights sparking up on their skin and in their eyes continued to flash in and out of view. After what seemed like an eternity, the hellish lightning engulfing the demons sparked up and started crackling continuously without fading. In that moment, the demons had just enough time to close their eyes, raise their heads upward to face the ceiling, and despairingly howl "NO!" before they abruptly exploded into clouds of dust that matched their respective body coloring.

In that instant, time seemed to stop, and the five clouds of unnaturally colored dust seemed to hover in place in the air at the positions where the demons had originally been standing. After exactly three seconds, the elemental blasts harmlessly crashed into the walls of the common room as the titans proceeded to pause in their defensive tactics, and the clouds of dust proceeded to explosively spread out into circular vortexes of dust that then sprinkled down onto the floor. For a few moments, the titans remained standing where they were, staring wordlessly at what now remained of the five demons that had invaded the tower and attempted to kill them. But after about a minute, small vortexes of shadowy energy abruptly appeared on the floor directly underneath the dust, swallowing it all up before closing up and vanishing immediately afterward.

For all of five seconds afterward, the titans gaped at the now empty floor spots where the remains of the five demons had been. The awkward silence was finally broken when Starfire slowly stated, "It appears . . . that we are victorious."

Starfire's comment was enough to get the other titans back down to Earth, and they nodded and mumbled in agreement. "It certainly looks that way to me," said Beast Boy. "I mean, I'm not the only one who saw those things explode into dust right?"

"No need to worry about that," said Raven. "I saw it to, and if those things were about to reform any time soon, I would have sensed it."

"According to my scanners, they certainly aren't in the tower anymore," said Cyborg. "Odds are, they're definitely dead," he then said before looking at Robin and saying, "I daresay your plan appears to have worked man."

Robin briefly found himself lost for words, wondering just what he could say that would truly sound appropriate for the current moment. "Apparently so," he eventually said. He looked at the other titans. "Nice work team." The other titans nodded, and mumbled statements of thanks.

"Umm," said Beast Boy. "So now that those demon thingies are dead, does that mean we can go back to sleep now?"

"Soon," said Robin as he walked on over to the security monitor positioned on the wall directly to the left of the two large sliding doors located to the side directly opposite from the windows. "But first we need to quickly take care of a few things."

"Like what?" Cyborg asked.

"Well for starters," Robin explained as he logged onto the security monitor, "We need to figure out why the security system didn't go off the second those demons entered the tower, or even stepped foot on the island."

Immediately after he said this, Robin managed to log on, and his eyes widened as he noticed a very surprising detail. "It's off."

"You mean something's wrong with it?" Cyborg asked.

"No," said Robin. "It's literally been turned off. Someone's deactivated it."

The other titans gathered around Robin and the security monitor. Sure enough, the entire security system for the tower had been deactivated.

Beast Boy gulped, and then stated, "Well I guess that explains why the alarms didn't go off when the demons got here."

"Wow, what gave it away?" Cyborg asked sarcastically.

"Well with that done, now the question is how it got turned off, and more importantly, who turned it off," said Raven.

"I certainly didn't turn it off," said Cyborg. "Heck, as far as I know, we haven't even touched anything remotely related to the tower's security functions once since we got back from Tokyo." Directly after saying this, he directed a look of suspicion towards Beast Boy from out of the corners of his eyes before stating, "Then again . . ."

"Dude," said Beast Boy, "whoever turned that off, it wasn't me. I may be a prankster, but turning off our own security system? That's low, even for me!"

Beast Boy then suddenly looked as if he'd just had an epiphany. "Heck, how do we even know it was turned off today?"

Robin thought to himself, and then pointed at Beast Boy before saying, "Good point, I'll go check."

"Oh come on Robin," said Cyborg. "You know Bee. If anyone had turned it off before she left today, she would have turned it back on. And I know for a fact that she definitely would have neither turned it off herself, nor allowed any of the Titans East boys to do so while they were staying here or before they left."

"I know Cyborg," said Robin. "But it's better to be safe than sorry." At that moment, he managed to access the activation/deactivation history menu on the monitor. "And yes, according to this, it was indeed turned off today."

The boy wonder squinted at the time that the security system had been turned off, and then turned his head to face Cyborg. "Cyborg, do you think you could access your internal clock and try to match the time this was deactivated to any particular event that occurred today?"

"Let me see," said Cyborg as he made his way over to take a look at the security monitor. He stared intently at the displayed recent time the security system had been deactivated, his facial expression making him look as if he were deep in thought. "Well, from what I can gather from comparing this to my internal clock data, the security was turned off at the exact time we started battling Johnny Rancid earlier today."

Robin thought to himself. "Hmm," he then said. "Same time as we were battling Johnny."

"In other words," said Raven. "Either this was a coincidence, or our battle with Johnny Rancid was a diversion to allow for someone else, likely a demon, to deactivate the security system."

"But how would anyone have even managed to get past the security system while we were gone fighting Johnny?" Beast Boy asked.

"It might not have been that hard if the culprit was one of those demons," said Raven. She looked at Beast Boy and said, "Remember how they were capable of taking on that smoke-like form? The security system based on the island outside the tower is ground based. In their smoke forms, the demons were capable of flying. They would have almost certainly have been more than capable of avoiding triggering the security system while it was still on by flying over it."

"That doesn't explain how a demon would have managed to get inside the tower," Robin stated.

"On the contrary," said Raven. "It does. In incorporeal form, demons are like ghosts. They are capable of going right through solid barriers and objects when in their smoke forms. In that form, any demon would have easily been capable of both flying out of reach of the security system and phasing right through the front door, roof top entrance, or even through one of the common room windows."

"Well if they can do that, then why turn off the security?" Cyborg asked.

"Unlike with ghosts," said Raven, "phasing through solid barriers costs demons energy. Odds are, the demons wanted to be at full strength when they got in the tower and attempted to kill us."

"How do you know all this?" Robin asked.

"I'm half demon," said Raven. "I have a more or less firm understanding of demonology. And I also have more than one book in my collection about the subject of demons and similar hellish and demonic topics."

"And you wait till now to tell us about all this?" Robin asked.

Beast Boy placed himself protectively between Robin and Raven, a glare on his face. "Lay her off Robin," he growled. "This attack caught her by surprise just as much as it did the rest of us. Heck, until tonight, Raven was the only one who even suspected that the ones we fought during that incident with her father weren't the only ones in existence. And besides, even before then, demons have rarely ever actively gotten involved with the affairs of the world of the living. Would you have expected them to go after us now?"

The other titans gaped at Beast Boy in surprise. They had never seen Beast Boy act so protective of Raven before. And they then realized that what Beast Boy said did make sense. "He does have a point," Cyborg said to Robin.

Robin gulped, hung his head, and then nodded. "You're right," he admitted. He looked at Beast Boy and Raven. "I'm sorry."

"Apology accepted," said Raven.

"Well on that note," said Cyborg. "Your knowledge on demons could probably be useful in answering a few more questions Raven."

"Well that would depend on the questions, but with the current circumstances you're free to ask whatever questions needed at the moment," said Raven.

Robin was quick to take advantage of the opportunity, and he asked, "Those demons that just now tried to kill us tonight, is there any chance they were working on their own?"

"Highly unlikely," said Raven. "Demons may be vicious and evil, but they rarely ever act solely on a whim. The majority of the time, demons typically do their work while answering to someone else's orders."

"Well that water dude was the leader of the group that tried to kill us just now," said Beast Boy. "Do you think he was the one behind the whole thing?"

"No," said Raven. "He may have been the leader of that group, but from what I know of demonology, he was probably more of a sergeant than anything else. And on that same note, that group of demons we just killed was most likely just a small advance party. Odds are, there's a larger force of demons somewhere else that sent them here."

At the sound of this, Raven's fellow titans looked at each other nervously. "Um Raven," said Starfire. "If there is in fact a larger group of these things you call demons out there who sent the ones who just tried to kill us, would it be reasonable to assume that more of them shall now end up coming to the tower now that we've killed their advance party?"

Raven hung her head. "Sadly yes," she responded.

The titans looked each other in the eyes nervously again. "Well I hope you know of some ways to defend ourselves against them," said Robin. "Because I doubt we'll be able to pull off that stunt we used against the advance party earlier a second time."

"The books I read do indeed make mention of the weaknesses of demons and defenses against them," Raven responded.

"Can you tell us what they are?" Beast Boy asked.

Raven nodded. "There's holy water."

"How does that help?" Cyborg asked.

"Holy water is like acid to Abrahamic demons," Raven explained. "Apply it to their skin and it burns them like crazy."

Beast Boy whistled. "That's cool," he said.

"Indeed," said Robin. "But the question is, how would we get ahold of holy water? I highly doubt that the nearest church will let us borrow any."

"I have a rosary in my room," said Raven. "And I know a ritual that we can use to make holy water."

"I say we do it," said Cyborg. He clasped his metallic hands together, and then said, "Now we just need to decide on what water we should bless."

"Could we use the ocean surrounding our home?" Starfire asked.

"I wouldn't recommend that," said Raven. "The ocean's too large. I'm not entirely certain of the area of effect that would be formed from attempting to make holy water out of the ocean surrounding our island. And besides not only would it be a little difficult for me to get the rosary back out of the ocean, but any demons that come to visit in the future will more likely than not just fly right over the ocean and land on the island surface as opposed to in the ocean."

"Well what water do we have right here in the tower we could bless?" Robin asked.

"Oooh," Beast Boy said. "How about the sprinkler system? We've always got loads of water stored up for use in that! And it's right outside the tower!"

"That will work," said Cyborg.

"How would we get it to activate?" Robin asked.

Cyborg made a dismissive gesture. "Piece of cake," he said. "I still have that feature on it that I installed during me and BB's last prank war that allows it to be automatically turned on whenever someone walks through an invisible laser line that serves as a trigger."

Robin gaped at Cyborg in surprise. "Ok then," said the boy wonder. "In that case, go ahead and turn it on and we can have this holy water defense set up in no time. But before we do that, Raven, I want you to tell us every other weakness you know that we might be able to use for tonight and the future. I want as many defenses set up as possible just in case any future demon visitors manage to get past the holy water."

"Demons can't cross iron," said Raven. "Place it in their path, and it's like there's an invisible force making it physically impossible for them to step over it in their corporeal forms. In fact, they're even incapable of flying over it in their incorporeal forms."

"Got it," said Robin. "We can set up some iron bar boundaries around the base of the tower, the edges of the roof, and the windows. Anything else?"

"Devil's traps," said Raven. "When demons walk within one of these, they are unable to get out unless the trap is broken in any way. We can paint them on the ceilings and floors of the tower for in case they manage to get in. And for that matter, we can also place salt lines in front of the doors to each room. Lines of salt have a similar effect on demons as iron. In fact, if you throw salt in the face of a being that's possessed by one, the resulting pain is so powerful that it causes the demon to automatically eject itself from its host and turn back to its natural corporeal form afterward."

Robin nodded. "Good," he then said. "Alright team, let's get to work. We've got to fortify this tower as quickly as we can."

Beast Boy and Starfire raised their hands. Robin sighed, and then said, "Ok, I'll let you two ask your questions first. But after that, we need to hurry and get the tower set up for future demon visits."

Starfire nodded, and said to Raven, "Raven, I remember that Robin once told me that when he and Slade were searching for you while Trigon was here on Earth, he was able to kill a large group of the demons that work for Trigon with his sword. Would it perhaps be capable of killing these demons that now attack us?"

Raven looked at Robin with an inquisitive look on her face. She had not been told about this. Robin chuckled nervously, and proceeded to summon his sword by interlocking the 'wings' of his two appropriate birdirangs together. Raven examined it, and then nodded before handing the sword back to Robin and saying, "Yes, it appears that whoever forged this placed the necessary spells upon it that would allow for it to be capable of killing demons."

Cyborg whistled, and said to Robin, "Looks like we've got our very own secret weapon against them."

Robin grinned sheepishly, and then said, "Apparently so." He turned to look at Beast Boy and said, "What did you want to ask Raven?"

"Raven," said Beast Boy. "Considering how you're . . . well, you know . . . do these things you mentioned have the same effect on you as it does on regular demons?"

Raven shook her head side to side. "Not exactly," she replied. "While I'll admit that I haven't tested out the effects of holy water or salt on me, I have demonstrated the ability to cross iron, and have also proven capable of walking in and out of devil's traps without any trouble. Odds are, I'm not quite as vulnerable to these things because of how I'm not a pureblood demon."

Beast Boy nodded, looking relieved, and said, "That's good to hear."

He then looked at Robin and said, "Ok Rob, I'm done."

"Good," said Robin. "Now let's get to work. I want to have as many demon defense mechanisms set up as possible before any more demons come to visit. And we also still need to turn the security system back on. Once we're all set up, we can go right back to bed. Titans, move." In a flash, the titans spread out to start setting up their tower for future visits from demons.

**And just like that, another chapter comes to an end! What you guys think? Did you enjoy this? For that matter, what did you think about the battles in this chapter or the big reveal about what that shadowy thing from the previous chapter (not to mention the ominous mystery fourteen-eyed being from the prologue if you were paying a particularly large amount of attention) has turned out to be? Once again, I hope you guys all enjoyed this, and feel free to comment on all manner of elements in this chapter in your reviews. And let's not forget, I hope you very much look forward to when I post the next chapter in this story.**

**Coming up next: The next morning, thanks to the results of some quick thinking from Cyborg, the Titans have their hands full interrogating a large number of demons for the sake of figuring who sent them and why.**


	6. An Early Morning Interrogation

**Hey there everybody! I hope you're all ready for some more Teen Titanic awesomeness, because here is a brand new chapter! In this chapter, thanks to some resourceful thinking on the part of our favorite half robot, the titans find themselves interrogating a large group of demons for the sake of figuring out who sent them after the titans and why. Here's to hoping you read, review, and enjoy (but it definitely wouldn't hurt for you to review).**

**Again, I do not own Teen Titans.**

**Now, on with the fic!**

**Chapter 5:**

**An Early Morning Interrogation**

The very next morning, at 8:15 sharp, the Titans were gathered together in the common room having their breakfast. Unlike most mornings, the five teenage heroes were surprisingly quiet as they had their breakfast this morning. Robin was eating a bagel, and had his usual coffee next to his plate as he also proceeded to do his daily newspaper reading at the same time he was eating his bagel. Starfire was calmly consuming her favorite sugary cereal from Earth, but sadly in her usual fashion of slurping it down instead of using a spoon. Beast Boy was calmly gnawing away at his freshly defrosted tofu waffles. Raven was calmly sipping her tea, making sure to take a bite of her toast every few minutes or so. And of course, Cyborg was heartily devouring his own non-tofu waffles. But over the course of the entire breakfast, not one of them bothered to mention the events that had unfolded the previous night.

After getting started on their work at setting up the tower for defense against future demon visits, Robin had managed to get the security system reactivated in no time flat before heading off to help each of his friends with the demon proofing. Raven had initiated the process of demon proofing by going to her room and retrieving the rosary she had before, then teaching the water blessing ritual to Beast Boy. The changeling had then proceeded to go over to where the sprinkler water was stored and perform the ritual. Cyborg had begun his part by activating the invisible laser trigger that would cause the sprinklers to automatically turn on, and then proceeded to help out the other four titans in placing iron bar boundaries around the base of the tower, the edges of the roof, and the windows of the tower. With the outer defenses set up, the titans had worked together in placing salt lines by the doors to each room and painting devil's traps at assorted locations on the ceiling and floors. With all the preparations out of the way, only then had the titans finally gone back to their rooms and resumed their sleep. Surprisingly enough, they'd managed to sleep soundly for the rest of the night without any further abrupt wake up calls.

Now, after five minutes passed the completion of their breakfast, Robin decided to finally break the silence and discuss what had happened. "Well," he said, "I daresay I'm pleasantly surprised that we didn't have to deal with anymore demons last night after setting up the defenses."

"Agreed," said Starfire. "I am most thankful that we didn't get woken up again by demon visitors last night."

"Do you think that maybe no demons came last night after we set up the defenses?" Cyborg asked.

"Either it was that," said Robin. "Or none of the demons that did come after that managed to get past the holy water and iron boundaries." He looked at Beast Boy and Raven. "What do you guys think?"

Raven shrugged, seemingly noncommittal to this matter. Beast Boy, however, appeared to be deep in thought. "Umm, Robin," he stated. "I was just now wondering, if any demons did happen to come last night after we finished setting up the defenses and none of them made it past the defenses, then how we are going to find out who sent them after us?"

At the sound of this, Starfire gulped and looked at Robin nervously, clearly now worried about this detail now that Beast Boy had brought it up. Raven also looked at Robin with her eyebrow raised. Robin found himself cursing to himself in his mind. "Darn it," he thought to himself. "Why didn't I think of that?"

But then Cyborg said, "No need to worry. I've got that taken care of."

The other Titans looked at Cyborg. "How?" Robin asked.

Cyborg chuckled, walked over to one of the nearby computers, and said, "I'll show you."

The other Titans followed, and after they'd all taken positions by the computer, Cyborg proceeded to activate the security video footage, and then access one of the individual cameras. When the feedback from the chosen camera went full-screen, the other Titans were shocked to see that not only was the footage of a storage room located under the ground of the island past even the hangar and basement that had previously always been empty, but that the same room was now filled with a large seething and raging mass of demons that appeared to be contained within a massive devil's trap that had been painted across almost the entire floor.

As the other Titans gaped in shock at the large sea of demons contained within the massive devil's trap, Cyborg said, "As you can see, we have an entire Noah's Ark load of demons to interrogate."

"Cyborg," said Robin. "How did you manage do this?"

"Easy enough," said Cyborg. "I painted the trap in that area while you guys were busy painting traps on the ceilings and floors higher up. And as for how the demons got there, these are what I used." Upon saying the word 'these,' Cyborg pressed a button, and in a flash, what appeared to be large laser pistols jutted out from the undersides of the two horizontal 'arms' of Titans Tower and pointed at assorted areas around the island.

At the sight of the stunned look on Robin's face, Cyborg further explained, "I designed these babies last night. While battling the five demons that managed to get inside the tower last night, I managed to scan a complete sequence of their DNA, and I entered that data into the system. The scanners were updated to be capable of scanning for the pureblood DNA I scanned. The scanners detect an exact match of this DNA, and therefore a demon, these guns are designed to automatically come out into position and start firing. And the best part is, they're designed to fire zeta beams, so the moment the demons get blasted, they get teleported straight to the location I entered in the coordinates for, which in this case, is the storage area where I painted that big huge devil's trap."

After hearing this explanation, even Raven seemed vaguely impressed by what Cyborg had done. Robin eventually managed to say, "Cyborg. You are a genius."

"I have my moments," said Cyborg.

Robin then grinned, turned his head to face the other Titans, and said, "Well in that case, get ready team. We have an interrogation to make."

. . . . .

The large crowd of trapped demons were still milling around wildly within the giant devil's trap when the five teenage heroes entered the gigantic storage facility where they were currently being kept in. At the sight of them all, Robin whistled silently. Only now, with the entire crowd of demons directly in front of him as opposed to on a video screen, did he truly realize just how many demons Cyborg had managed to trap with his ingenious gadgetry the previous night. In fact, Robin had a feeling that it was a miracle that there'd been enough room within even the huge devil's trap in the room to contain them all.

Then Robin noticed another detail that only confirmed how lucky he and the other Titans were that Cyborg's massive devil's trap had worked. For not only were there countless black, blue, green, yellow, and red demons raging around on the ground, but there was also a likewise large number of purple scaled and eyed demons flying around in the air with taloned eagle-like feet, purple feathered wings in the places where all the other demons' arms were located, tufts of purple feathers at the ends of their tails and on the tops of their heads, and serrated beak-like mouths. Robin gulped at the sight of this, for if the amount of demons currently contained in the devil's trap had proven so large that all the flying demons had been forced to take to the air in order for there to be enough room, then he didn't even want to know the possibilities that could have occurred if there had been more demons than the devil's trap was potentially capable of containing.

He shook his head to clear his thoughts. "Now's not the time for random thoughts," he thought to himself. "I need to have my game face on and my mind clearly focused for when I interrogate these things."

Taking on the most serious and emotionless facial expression he could muster, Robin determinedly walked right up to the devil's trap border that was closest in proximity to the doorway that led from the anteroom to the storage room. As their leader made his way over towards the demons, the other Titans remained standing next to a faucet-like area that connected to a large underground tank of reserve water. Each of them was holding a goblet that they'd recently filled to the brim with said water, and was watching intently as they waited for the business they'd come for to begin. After taking on a firm standing position about one foot away from the boundary of the devil's trap, Robin glared at the massive crowd of demons and yelled, "Silence!"

At the sound of the boy wonder's commanding shout, every single one of the demons seething around in the devil's trap went silent and turned their heads to directly face him and the other Titans. Robin snarled, pointed directly at the demons, and hissed, "Alright, you little fiends, I hope you're listening, because I don't want any funny business from you today. Last night, five of your compatriots invaded my home and tried to kill me and my friends. This attack against us will not go unanswered, and the only reason you lot haven't already followed in the footsteps of your little advance party by now is because I need answers, and you're the only ones conveniently available who can give me the ones I want. You got that?"

The demons snarled, but grudgingly nodded their heads up and down.

Robin took one step forward, leaning forward with his glare still on his face. "Good," the boy wonder growled. "Now before we get started, who among you is the leader?" The demons growled and hissed in response.

Robin narrowed his eyes, appeared to closely gaze at the demons, and then abruptly drew out his sword and slashed it across the chest of a black demon standing directly in front of him. The demon had just enough time to let out an inhuman scream of pain before it exploded into dust. The remaining demons let out a unified hiss of fright and shock and backed up as far as the invisible barrier produced by the power of the devil's trap containing them would allow, clearly surprised and now wary of the fact that at least one of their captors had a weapon capable of killing them.

Robin pointed his sword at the demons again, and then yelled, "You see this?! With this blade, I am perfectly capable of killing you all; and believe me, this isn't the first time I've used this sword to kill one of your kin either! And since you aren't legally protected against being killed, I will gladly kill you all if I have to! Understand!?" The demons gulped, and nodded as if to say 'yes.'

"Good," said Robin. He retracted his sword, pointed his finger at the demons once again, and yelled, "Whichever one of you is the leader, show yourself now!"

In a flash, a sudden disturbance appeared to occur among the demons within the very center of the devil's trap, and a large stream of blood red smoke rose up from the ground-based crowd before gliding around in circles through the air like an air-born snake.

Robin's eyes narrowed. "I'm guessing that's the leader," he thought to himself. He pointed at the red smoke and yelled, "Alright, now take up a position so that I can see you clearly. As leader of the Teen Titans, I want to talk directly to you, face-to-face."

The other demons promptly began to move and jostle each other around as they struggled to make sure that there was enough room for their leader to take up a position directly in front of the masked boy in the traffic-light themed costume. No sooner had the demons all managed to clear up an empty space just big enough for the tip of the smoke stream to touch down on, when the blood red smoke that their leader had become proceeded to rear up like a snake and then slam itself head first on to the empty space. It reverted back to its corporeal form directly after landing, revealing a blood red demon.

The red demon straightened up to full standing height, and directed its red eyes straight at Robin's mask covered ones, an emotionless glare on its face very similar to Robin's own commanding and poker-faced glare. The demon snarled, gave a slight grudging nod of respect, and said, "I am Carnax! Captain of the Theta Squadron of the 13th Infernal Legion, at your service!"

Upon introducing himself, Carnax bowed, a very slow motion designed to be an insulting gesture. Robin showed no sign of being phased by the insult, and gave a slight nod of his head before saying, "Alright Carnax, as I've already mentioned, my team and I have important questions that need answers, and you and your squadron of warriors are the only ones currently available who can give me those answers. Now we're going to either do this the easy way or the hard way."

A wolfish grin crossed the crimson demon's face, and it chuckled arrogantly before derisively hissing, "You dare think it to be even remotely possible for one such as you to get any demon, much less me, to tell you our secrets?"

Robin's eyes narrowed beneath his mask. "I don't think that," Robin growled. "I know."

All the other demons gathered around behind Carnax 'oohed' and looked each other in the eyes with spunky looks in their eyes as if to say 'feisty.' Carnax chuckled, raised his eyebrow, and said, "A very healthy sense of self-esteem I see."

Robin said nothing, and the demon chuckled before shaking its head side to side and saying, "But nonetheless, I sure as my kin's domain won't be telling you anything just on your say so."

Robin snarled soundlessly, and stated, "Hard way it is then." He turned his head to face Cyborg who was standing behind Robin alongside Beast Boy and the girls, and said, "You know what to do."

Cyborg nodded, walked up to Robin's position, and then proceeded to splash the water in his goblet directly on Carnax's face. Carnax howled in shock and agony as acrid red smoke began to waft off of his face as if it were burning. His underlings reared back in shock, for they'd once again been taken by surprise.

Cyborg smirked, lifted up his now empty goblet so that it was in clear sight of all the demons, and said, "That's right ya'll! As you can see, we've come prepared. That reserve water tank you see the faucet for right here in this room, we made sure to have its contents blessed earlier this morning right before we entered this room. Therefore, we're more than capable of making things pretty painful for you if you don't answer our questions."

Robin nodded in agreement with Cyborg, looked back at Carnax, and then said, "Perhaps now you're willing to talk?"

Carnax growled at Robin, his red eyes filled with fury, and stated, "Do your worst boy blunder; I guarantee you will not get a thing out of me or my soldiers!"

"Have it your way then," said Robin. He turned his head to Raven and said, "Raven, let him have it."

Raven proceeded to levitate her goblet of holy water directly over Carnax's head and then cause it to flip upside down, spilling the contents right on top of him. The sound of Carnax's agonized howling filled the air immediately afterward.

. . . . .

One hour later, Robin was forced to grudgingly admit that demons definitely weren't the easiest to get to talk. For the last hour, the Titans and demons had found themselves in a seemingly never-ending cycle that went along the lines of Robin asking Carnax either if he was willing to talk or one of the questions he hoped to gain the answer to if the demons did finally crack, Carnax making an insulting, sarcastic or likewise uncooperative comment, and each of the other four Titans taking a turn spraying Carnax in the face with holy water in their own unique way. Cyborg had simply thrusted his goblet so that the contents went flying into Carnax's face whenever it had become time for his turn at torturing. Whenever it had been Raven's turn, the dark sorceress had levitated her goblet and flipped it upside down directly over Carnax's head. Beast Boy's turns at torture had consisted of him gulping his entire goblet's worth of holy water into his mouth, turning into an elephant, and spouting it all from his trunk into Carnax's face. As for Starfire, her form of holy water torture had involved her forcing Carnax's jaws open and pouring the contents of her goblet down his throat.

Now, Robin was almost positive that the large underground tank of holy water was half empty now, and still Carnax seemed as if he could last for entire centuries of torture. Carnax chuckled, his wolfish grin back on his face as his most recent holy water torture session finally wore off, and said, "I will admit, you certainly aren't one to give up easily, but your current efforts at torturing me into revealing the secrets of our current plans are an exercise in futility. We'd sooner sing hymns in praise of Heaven before telling you our secrets. Sooner or later, my warriors and I will escape from this trap somehow, and we will flay you and your friends alive, starting from the toes and working our way up to the tops of your heads."

Robin's eyes narrowed, and he then hissed, "Well I can assure you that it will take far less time for me to get you to crack then it will for you and your army to escape that trap." He turned around, looked back at Carnax, and said, "But for now, you get to have a reprieve. I have some things to discuss right now with my teammates. But I warn you, when we get back in here, the torture will be recommenced immediately, and it will be much more brutal."

Carnax chuckled, licked his chops as if he were hungry, and said, "I look forward to it." The other demons chuckled in agreement, the poison demons even hissing like snakes while they chuckled.

Robin, showing no signs of emotion, turned his head away from Carnax to face the other Titans, and then said, "Meeting in the anteroom of this level, now." Upon saying this, the boy wonder exited the storage room, closely followed by the other titans. Beast Boy in particular seemed rather eager to go back into the anteroom, not to mention still very squeamish and nauseous after hearing what Carnax had said about flaying him and the other Titans alive. Raven, however, briefly stopped long enough to use her powers to paint what appeared to be some form of ancient runes on both the doors to the chamber and the wall the doors were located on before exiting the storage chamber herself.

Seconds after Raven joined her teammates in the anteroom, the large sliding doors to the storage chamber closed. "You wanted to discuss something with us?" Raven asked.

Robin lifted his finger as if to say 'hold it,' and then asked, "Before I get started, what did you just do before you came in here?"

"I placed some ancient Azarathian silencing runes on the wall and doors," Raven responded. "Apply these runes to any surface, and all noise that occurs on the side opposite the ones with the runes on them will be incapable of being heard by anyone or anything on the sides with the runes. In other words, we now won't have to worry about anyone eavesdropping on this meeting."

The other Titans nodded their heads with impressed looks on their faces. "Well, that's certainly useful," said Robin. He then clapped his hands together as if signaling the beginning of a meeting and said, "Well with that out of the way, let's discuss the original reason for this meeting." The other Titans listened carefully. Robin took a deep breath, exhaled in a weary sigh, and said, "I hate to say this, but I have a feeling that we're going to need to rethink our strategy in this interrogation. At this rate, we'll all be 100 years old by the time we get these demons to crack." The other Titans nodded and mumbled in agreement. With their current nonexistent rate of success, they definitely needed to come up with a different way to torture the demons sufficiently enough to get them to answer their questions.

"If any of you have any ideas we could attempt, speak now," said Robin.

The other Titans thought to themselves. "Well you do have your sword," said Raven.

Robin shook his head. "I doubt that will work. I don't know how, but I have a feeling that threat of death or severe injuries won't be enough to get that demon to talk. Heck, those things would probably welcome it."

Raven shrugged, for she hadn't truly expected this idea to be accepted as the new strategy.

"Maybe Raven could talk to them or read their minds," Cyborg suggested.

"How would my talking to them be any more effective?" Raven asked.

"Well he does have a point," said Robin. "You are half demon, no offense. I think that Cyborg's trying to say that the demons might be more willing to talk to you since you are related to one of their kin. And if that fails, you could always use mind reading."

Raven shook her head. "While not a bad idea, I'm afraid neither of those suggestions will work," said Raven. "For starters, demons usually tend to not have very high opinions of demons from other forms of Hell, and since I'm half Trigonian demon and these ones are all Luciferian, odds are they would be more likely to spit at my feet then talk to me. And in fact, they'd be even less likely to treat me with respect since I'm only half demon and they're all purebloods, pure being a relative term. And as for mind reading, while they are capable of reading minds themselves, they are also immune to getting their own minds read by others."

"Perhaps we could offer to set them free?" Starfire asked. "It would certainly be the last thing they'd expect and it might surprise them into telling us what we want to know."

Robin shook his head. "I'm sorry Star, but while I do understand your reasoning, I doubt that would work. Deals with demons rarely ever end well, and I have a feeling that more likely than not, they'd ask us to free them first and then kill us the second the trap is broken." At the sight of Starfire hanging her head sadly in apparent shame, Robin said, "But still, good try."

As one, they all looked at Beast Boy, who now appeared to be in surprisingly deep thought. "Well," he then said. "I'm not entirely sure if this will work, but I was just now thinking about how rarely demons ever actually make physical appearances on Earth and wreak havoc. You've gotta admit that is true."

Robin nodded in agreement, and then said, "Indeed; and you're mentioning this why?"

"Well," said Beast Boy, "with that in mind, since this is very likely the first time these demons have gotten to walk the Earth in who knows how long, they're probably considering their current time here on Earth their own equivalent of a vacation."

Robin thought to himself. "Hmm, I guess I can see what you mean. But how is this going to help us?"

Beast Boy grinned, clasped his hands together so that his fingers intertwined, and said, "Well since this is hypothetically a vacation for the demons and they've likely not been out here on Earth for very long, who among you is willing to bet that they're not all that keen on returning home at any time in the near future?"

Robin, Starfire, and Cyborg looked very much confused after hearing all this. Raven, however, only looked confused for about five seconds before it abruptly hit her. "I think," said Raven, "that Beast Boy's trying to say that maybe we should threaten to exorcise them."

Upon hearing this, Robin and Cyborg promptly realized that this suggestion actually did match up with what Beast Boy appeared to be talking about. "Hmm, an exorcism threat could actually work," said Robin. "Alright then, we'll give it a shot."

"Please," said Starfire. "What exactly is this exorcism of which you speak?"

"It's a ritual that's used to banish demons from the mortal realm and send them back to Hell," said Raven.

Starfire raised her eyebrows in confusion. "What is this Hell place?"

The other Titans looked each other in the eyes awkwardly, not entirely certain as to how to explain this to the Tamaranean girl. Eventually, Robin took a deep breath, looked directly at Starfire, and asked, "Star, do your kin have a concept of the afterlife?"

Starfire nodded. "Indeed. My people believe that when we die, the souls of the virtuous and likewise good Tamaraneans travel to M'ngwarl, the palace of our goddess X'hal, where they live in eternal bliss and happiness."

"What happens to the bad ones?" Beast Boy asked.

Starfire shuddered, looked down at her feet, and said, "A fate far worse than ceasing to exist. On my planet, it is believed that the souls of the evil are sent down to the dark and terrifying realm of Dahak, where they are eternally mauled and ravaged by the savage and bloodthirsty thirteen-headed fire serpent, Ahz'rogha."

Robin gulped, lifted up his finger as if about to make a point, and said, "Well Star, that realm you just described called Dahak, that's basically the Tamaranean equivalent of Hell."

Starfire gulped, and involuntarily shivered as she found her mind abruptly filled with nightmarish images.

Cyborg, ever the big brother figure, decided to get things moved away from the matters of what Hell was, and said, "So in other words, you think that the potential for us abruptly terminating their vacation when it's barely even begun might get them to talk?"

Beast Boy shrugged, spread his hands out to his sides, and said, "It might, I mean, I'd be pretty pissed off if my vacation were to be unfairly cut short. For all we know, these demons might feel the same way about their time outside Hell."

"Then that settles it," said Robin as he clasped his hands together. "Raven, do you have any books on how to exorcise demons?"

Raven smirked. "Thought you'd never ask."

**And just like that, another chapter over! I hope you guys all enjoyed this, leave a healthy bunch of reviews, and will be looking forward to the next chapter! Till then, this is A-LionGleek signing out.**

**Coming up next: The titans resume their interrogation, but this time with a far more powerful threat (aka. an exorcism) at the ready. Will there new powerful trick be enough to get the demons to talk? Find out next chapter! ^_^**


	7. The Exorcism

**Hey ya'll! I hope you're ready for yet more awesomeness, because here's a brand new chapter! In this chapter in the lives of our favorite teenage superheroes, the titans resume their efforts at torturing their demon captives into revealing who sent them to kill the titans and why. But this time, they have a brand new tactic up their sleeve (namely, an exorcism) that will hopefully prove much more effective at getting the demons to talk. Sound exciting? I certainly hope so! ^_^**

**To remind you guys once more, I do not own Teen Titans. Also, the exorcism rite used in this chapter is borrowed from the hit TV series, Supernatural. And with that out of the way, onward with the fic!**

**Chapter 6:**

**The Exorcism**

At the sound of the doors opening up, Carnax directed his head to face that direction in time to see the Titans walk back into the room. With a wolfish grin on his face, he said, "I see that you still yet choose to continue your useless endeavor."

"You could say that," said Robin. "But this time, we have a far more effective form of torture planned."

Carnax chuckled, bowed his head in an insulting gesture, and then said, "Well bring it on, bird boy. We're all trembling with anticipation." The other demons hissed and jeered in agreement.

Robin made a smug grin back at the demons, and then said, "As you wish." He turned to the other Titans and winked at Raven. In a flash, Raven drew out a large book from her cloak.

At the sight of the book, Carnax raised his eyebrow. "A little early for you to be reading us bedtime stories, don't you think?" he derisively asked.

"It certainly isn't for us to be reading this kind of story," said Robin. "Raven, you're free to begin."

Raven proceeded to open the book she was holding, hold it up to her face, and slowly read out loud, "Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus."

As Raven said these words, the demon's eyes widened in horror as they realized too late what Raven was now reading. And even if they hadn't heard these words before, the slight feeling of nausea that was now starting to develop in their throats and deep within their stomachs was more than enough proof for them to know what Raven was doing.

Carnax looked straight at Robin with an incredulous look on his crimson dragon-like face. "An exorcism?" he hissed. "Seriously?"

"Yep," said Robin. "Since you and your army wouldn't cooperate and answer our questions like nice little demons, we decided to just send you all home and try our luck with someone else."

"Are you out of your mind?!" Carnax yelled, clearly horrified and surprised now. "Do you have any idea how rarely me and my kin get to leave Hell and walk the Earth freely? We only just got here yesterday and we haven't even been here for a full 24 Earth hours yet!" The other demons growled, hissed, and squawked in agreement with a similar fearful tone.

Robin made a tongue clicking noise as if to say 'tut, tut,' and then said, "Well, it's either you answer our questions," before gesturing towards Raven and continuing, "or your vacation comes to a premature end."

At the same time that this brief conversation occurred between Robin and Carnax, Raven continued calmly reading, "Omnis satanica potestas, omnis incursio infernalis adversarii, omnis legio, omnis congregatio et secta diabolica."

Robin lifted his hand as if to signal Raven to stop, and she stopped reading the exorcism. The boy wonder looked at the demons and calmly asked, "Perhaps now you're willing to talk?"

Carnax growled, and responded, "You are clever, I will admit to that, but it will take much more than just one verse of an exorcism to get me or my men to answer your questions."

Robin grinned. "I'm happy to hear that," he stated. "Because this little 'bedtime story' as you put it is just starting to get good." He turned his head back to Raven and said, "Continue."

"Ergo draco maledicte et omnis legio diabolica adjuramus te. Cessa decipere humanas creaturas, eisque aeternae Perditionis venenum propinare."

As Raven read this verse, the demons started shaking and acting as if they were fighting not to vomit. Right as Raven said the last word of that verse, Carnax abruptly bent over and growled. Robin had Raven stop reading the exorcism and leaned forward to see if the demon was now willing to talk.

"Why are you here?" Robin asked.

Carnax snarled, "Kiss my backside!"

Robin shook his head side to side, looked back at Raven, and said, "Continue."

"Vade, Satana, inventor et magister omnis fallaciae, hostis humanae salutis. Humiliare sub potenti manu dei, contremisce et effuge, invocato a nobis sancto et terribili nomine, quem inferi tremunt."

This time, Carnax opened his mouth and howled in agony as if the sound of the words Raven was reading were now causing him physical pain. Robin had Raven stop reading the exorcism, leaned over to Carnax and asked, "Will you answer our questions now?"

"Up yours," Carnax growled.

"Wrong answer," said Robin. He turned back to Raven. "Continue," he barked.

"Ab insidiis diaboli, libera nos, Domine. Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus

omnis satanica potestas, omnis incursio infernalis adversarii, omnis legio, omnis congregatio et secta diabolica."

Robin, the other titans, and even the other demons were caught completely by surprise when Carnax started laughing after Raven finished reading this verse. Raven didn't even need Robin to signal for her to stop reading this time. Carnax eventually managed to finish laughing, point at Raven, and look at Robin with a half fearful and half insanely happy look on his face before saying, "Do you seriously expect this to work?!"

Robin shook his head in disapproval, looked back at Raven, and said, "Continue."

Raven looked back down at the page she had her exorcism book opened up to, and continued, "Ergo draco maledicte et omnis legio diabolica adjuramus te. Cessa decipere humanas creaturas, eisque aeternae Perditionis venenum propinare."

"Stop!" Carnax yelled with his right hand raised as if to ward off a blow. Robin gave his hand signal, and Raven stopped reading. With the exorcism now paused directly before the final verse, the titans looked intently at the demons "Stop," Carnax hissed in an almost pleading tone. "You win, you win! I'll talk! Just don't read the last verse!"

"You swear on that?" Robin asked.

"Yes," Carnax howled. "On Lucifer's crown! Just tell me what you want and I'll do it!"

Robin looked to Raven, who nodded, and stated, "He's telling the truth."

Robin nodded, looked back at Carnax, and pointed at him and the other demons before saying, "Alright Carnax, here's what I want. All you have to do is answer a few questions, and you and your army can get out of that devil's trap."

"Fine," Carnax said compliantly. "Ask away!" The other demons nodded hurriedly in agreement, desperate to avoid getting exorcised and having their first vacation in millennia terminated.

Cyborg whistled, looked over at Beast Boy, and said, "Looks like your plan worked BB."

Beast Boy chuckled, clasped his hands together on the back of his head the way Sora from Kingdom Hearts often did, and then said, "What can I say? I have my moments every now and then." Raven rolled her eyes at the sound of that comment, but said nothing else.

Robin took a deep breath, exhaled, and then asked, "Alright Carnax, here's my first question. How are you and your army now here on Earth instead of in Hell?"

"We were summoned," Carnax responded instantly.

Robin nodded. "I had a feeling that would be the answer. Alright then, who summoned you?"

"Two men," said Carnax. "Not quite mortal, but still capable of being sent to the afterlife."

"Can you describe these two men in further detail?"

"Yes, one of them was very bulky and muscular. He looked like a warrior from the days in which your kind lived in caves and hunted woolly mammoths but was dressed up in more or less modern day cloths. He had long hair, and he had scars all over his face as if something had slashed its claws across it."

Robin held up his hand to indicate for Carnax to stop talking. The demon paused in his speech, and Robin turned his head to face the other titans. "That man he just described, does he sound familiar to any of you?"

The other Titans shook their heads in the negative. "I'm pretty sure I would have remembered seeing a caveman-like villain if we'd ever encountered one," said Beast Boy.

Robin thought to himself, and reluctantly decided that indeed the Titans had not encountered such a person. Yet for some reason, he had a feeling that this person the demon had described sounded vaguely familiar. Deciding to file this information for later, he looked back at Carnax and said, "What about the other man? You said there were two who summoned you and your army."

Carnax thought to himself, grimaced, and then said, "Well, I can't say for sure just what he looked like. He wouldn't take off his mask."

"A mask," said Robin. "Can you describe that?"

"Yes," said Carnax. "It was black on one side and orange on the other. The orange side was the only one that had an eye hole on it. It made him look like he had only one eye. Does that help?"

Robin nodded, looked over at the other Titans, and then said, "Him we definitely find familiar."

Beast Boy and Cyborg mumbled in agreement, Raven closed her eyes and nodded slightly, and Starfire proceeded to look slightly to her left with a depressed look on her face as if she felt saddened by the thought of who the man the demon had described sounded like. No one needed to even say the name. They had a feeling that this man with the one eyed mask that had just now been described by their demon prisoner was their arch nemesis, Slade himself.

Robin nodded his head as if resigning himself to the information he'd now gathered, and then looked back at Carnax before saying, "Why did you come here to attack us?"

Carnax glared, and then stated, "Don't you think the answer to that's . . ."

At the sight of Robin turning his head and raising up his hand as if about to signal Raven to resume her reading of the exorcism, Carnax extended his hand out as if to stop with a terrified look on his face and yelled, "We were sent here to kill you!"

"That's more like it," said Robin. He looked back at Carnax and asked, "Why were you sent here to kill me and my friends?"

Carnax took a couple deep breathes, and eventually managed to say, "Our king, Lucifer, is currently in a partnership of sorts with the two men who summoned us, and he says that with their help, we could be on the verge of a breakthrough that could allow every single one of us to exit Hell without fail and conquer the Earth so that we can have an even easier time of attempting to allow his Malevolence to leave Hell himself earlier than foretold."

As Robin was about to ask how this information had anything to do with any need for him and the other Titans to be killed, Carnax continued, "According to what the long haired one said, his Malevolence won't give him and the man with the one-eyed mask the information they need to help him unless they arrange for an early trip to the afterlife for a team of heroes that serve the cause of his Malevolence's father and brothers. Apparently, his Malevolence thought that you would be the ideal choice."

Beast Boy whistled, looked over at Raven, and then whispered, "I'm not sure if I should feel honored that Lucifer thought us worthy of fighting against his soldiers, or insulted by how easy of a target he appears to have thought we would be."

"Good question," Raven droned.

Satisfied with this answer, Robin asked, "This information you mentioned that the two men who summoned you wanted, can you tell me what it is?"

Carnax shook his head. "I don't know what that information is."

Robin's eyes narrowed. "Are you sure about that?" he asked with his voice clearly threatening to have Raven resume her reading of the exorcism.

"Yes, honest," Carnax howled. "I don't know. And neither do my men!"

"And how would that be possible?" Robin asked. "You're demons. Surely you know everything your precious king, Lucifer, has up his sleeve."

Carnax sighed, hung his head, and said, "There are some things that his Malevolence only shares with the five members of his inner circle. Whatever this information the men who summoned us want to know is, it is one such thing; and I'm only a captain. I just do as I'm told. Eviscerate first, and ask questions later. That's the code for us minor demons." The other demons gathered around behind Carnax nodded their heads in agreement, their eyes all closed.

Robin thought to himself, and then asked, "Is there anyone you know who could tell us what this information is?"

Carnax nodded. "Not very many. The best choices I know are for you to either ask one of the men who summoned us, one of the five members of our master's inner circle, or his Malevolence himself. And I doubt either of them will be all that keen on telling you."

"Hmm," said Robin. After a few minutes passed, he nodded, and then said, "Very well then. That takes care of all my questions for now." He turned his head to Raven, and then said, "Finish it."

At the sound of this, the eyes of the demons widened in shock and horror. "What?!" Carnax roared.

"You heard me," Robin growled, a glare on his face showing through his mask, and said, "Now that you've answered all our questions, it's time for you all to go now."

"You said you would let us out!" Carnax snarled. The other demons growled in agreement.

Robin raised his eyebrow. "Oh really?" he asked. "Last time I checked, I said that you'd be getting out of the trap. I didn't say anything about actually releasing you from it and letting you back out into the world of the living."

Carnax hissed, and then yelled, "Why you little swine!"

"I'd be careful if I were you," said Robin, his tone indicating how very close Carnax now was to getting a demon killing sword thrusted through his chest. "And besides, you should really be considering this to be a favor. After all, considering both how you've now failed to complete your mission and how my teammates and I have now learned very important information about your plans, you're going to need to inform your superiors as soon as possible. With that in mind, exorcising you will allow you to speed your way right back to home base."

Carnax and the majority of the other demons snarled in fury upon hearing this. The only exception was a single blue demon who appeared to be deep in thought. "He does have a point," the blue demon then stated.

"You idiot," roared a black demon standing right next to the blue demon who'd just spoken. "Whose side are you on?!" The other demons howled and roared in agreement with their comrade and they all proceeded to rush over towards the offending water demon as if about to beat it up.

"ENOUGH!" Carnax roared. The other demons turned their heads to face their leader. Carnax growled, and yelled, "Have you lost your minds?! I thought I trained you better than this! Have you forgotten that while you are right now about to squabble like younglings, we are in a far more dire situation?!" The other demons gulped, hung their heads, and proceeded to dejectedly get themselves back into a more orderly position.

Carnax snarled, turned his head to face the titans once more, and then stated, "I don't care what you had in mind when you said you'd allow us out of this trap, but you will release us right here in this tower now!"

"Or what!" Robin yelled. "Last time I checked, you're the ones stuck inside a demonic roach motel with your powers on timeout!" Carnax snarled irritably upon hearing this. "And besides," Robin then shouted. "Considering what happened to your advance party last night, you're getting off lightly! I could have just now gone ahead and drawn out my sword and killed you all right now! But instead, I'm letting you live long enough to be exorcised back to Hell so you can have a higher chance of informing your superiors about the current situation more quickly!"

Upon shouting this, Robin turned his head to Raven once again, and commandingly growled, "Finish it."

Raven glanced at the exorcism, then looked back up from it, her face now showing that she wasn't sure what to do.

Robin glared at Raven, his eyes narrowing, and then hissed, "Raven, that's an order."

Raven glanced at the demons, and then looked at Robin before saying, "Are you really sure about this? We are technically welching on them."

Robin groaned, grabbed his hair with his hands, and then stated, "Raven, exorcising them won't be breaking our part of the bargain. I said that if they answered our questions, then I'd allow them to get out of that trap, and exorcising them will indeed allow them to get out of the devil's trap."

"I'm serious Robin," said Raven. "It really might not be a good idea for us to just take on a technicality like this. If we don't follow through properly on this deal, then we'd be no better than them."

Robin sighed in irritation, glared at Raven with his fists clenched and his face blank and emotionless, and then proceeded to grit his teeth and tensely growl, "Finish. The. Exorcism."

Raven still seemed uncertain. Fortunately, before Robin could further lose his temper, Beast Boy then said, "Do it Raven. It's better for us to just exorcise them now then for us to release them from the trap right now and allow them the chance to cause further havoc."

Raven turned her head to face Beast Boy. "Beast Boy," said Raven. "I mean what I say. If we fulfill our part of the bargain we currently have with them on only a technicality, then we're no better than them."

"Well we'd be a whole lot worse than them if we allowed them to continue to walk the Earth and cause trouble for people when we could have prevented them from doing so by sending them straight back to Hell after having finished obtaining all the information we could get from them," Beast Boy responded.

"Oh you wouldn't have to worry about that," Carnax hissed. "Trust me, if you were to break this trap and allow us to be released back into freely wandering through your world, you won't live to regret it."

Robin's eyes narrowed as he glanced at the demons from out of the corner of his eyes. Cyborg examined a voice stress analyzer he had built into his arm, and then looked up from it before saying in an almost surprised tone, "He's telling the truth."

"I can sense that," said Raven.

Beast Boy nodded. "I know Raven. I do to. But my animal instincts are also saying that what he means is that he and his men will kill us so quickly that we won't even realize what's happening until we're already dead. Trust me Raven, my animal instincts are never wrong."

Raven sighed, looked at Beast Boy, and then said harshly, "Well if that's true, then how come you never seem to actually follow them?" Robin, Starfire, and Cyborg gaped at Raven in shock at the scathing comment they'd just heard. The demons also looked briefly surprised, but then a majority of them had sickening grins come on their faces.

Beast Boy took a deep breath as if trying to keep his temper from exploding, exhaled, and then said, "You'd be surprised at how often I do follow my instincts, Ra_ven_." He then looked back up in Raven's eyes with a slight glare on his face. "Contrary to your belief, I rarely ever disobey my instincts. In fact, the few times I've ever done so that haven't involved my efforts at getting you to smile or laugh, I've almost always ended up regretting it. The only times I've ever done so without regretting it are my ritualistic efforts at getting you to laugh or even smile; heck, the only animal whose even in open support of those efforts is the Beast, and you know I'd never follow _his_ suggestions unless it's truly worth it."

Raven and the other Titans were briefly surprised. Then Raven's glare came back on her face, and she folded her arms across her chest with the book still in her clutches before saying, "Well, name one incident where you truly did regret not following your instincts."

Beast Boy took a deep breath with his eyes closed, exhaled, and then opened his eyes back up to look directly at Raven before calmly stating, "I ignored what they said about Terra before she betrayed us."

For five seconds, Raven and the other Titans didn't quite grasp the meaning of what Beast Boy said. But then the full import of his words struck them, and they gaped at him in surprise. Raven in particular looked as if she'd just been slapped in the face. Even the demons now looked stunned speechless. Beast Boy sighed, hung his head, and then said "Yes, you heard correctly. In between the time Terra first ran away from us after Robin accidentally framed me for revealing her then secret and the time she betrayed us and revealed her allegiance to Slade, my instincts were roaring at me that she wasn't to be trusted. But I didn't listen to them. I didn't want to believe them; that's how much I loved her back then. But when all the animals in my mind turned out to have been correct all along that time, you wouldn't believe how much I hated myself."

The changeling took a deep breath, exhaled, and then said "This time, I cannot ignore my instincts, and believe me, neither can the rest of you. The cost this time, would be far too high for any of us to ever hope to afford." He looked at Raven, sighed, and then said, "You know what the right thing to do in this situation is Raven. Do what Robin says. Finish it."

For a few more minutes, Raven continued to gape at Beast Boy in stunned silence. Then she gulped, hung her head, and then looked back at the demons. At the sight of the now very sheepish grins on the faces of the demons, the sorceress's eyes narrowed. "He's right," she thought to herself. "Exorcising them is the right thing for us to do."

Now hard-eyed and determined, Raven raised the book back up so that the exorcism she was using was once again within her eyesight, and then began to read the final verse. And at the same time the demons were all snarling, growling, and seething around in rage as they furiously tried to somehow break themselves out of the devil's trap, Raven calmly read, "Ut Ecclesiam tuam secura tibi facias libertate servire te rogamus, audi nos."

"NO!" the demons howled in despair as their heads involuntarily jerked back, their mouths snapped open, and what appeared to be jets of smoke that matched their respective colors came rocketing upwards from their mouths towards the ceiling. And as the smoke came close to coming into contact with the ceiling, a gigantic portal of shadows appeared out of nowhere in the air and the smoke flowed into it. For the next few minutes, the smoke continued to spout up from the demons' mouths and into the portal. After what seemed like an eternity, the bodies of the demons seemed to collapse into smoke as well before joining up with the smoke streams that had been rocketing upwards from their mouths and flowing completely into the portal, which then closed and vanished seconds later, leaving nothing but a gigantic empty devil's trap.

After what seemed like an eternity, Cyborg broke the awkward silence by saying, "Well, that went nicely."

Beast Boy rolled his eyes, looked over at Raven, and then said, "You ok?"

Raven sighed, closed her eyes, and nodded her head. "Better," she responded.

"Um Beast Boy?" Robin asked. The changeling turned his head. Robin cleared his throat, and then asked, "What you said about your animal instincts and what they said about Terra, was that true?"

Beast Boy sighed, and nodded his head. "Yes, it's true," he then said before looking back up at Robin and saying bitterly, "I guess that means a lecture, huh?"

Robin winced, shook his head side to side, and placed his hand comfortingly on the green boy's shoulder. "No," the boy wonder responded. "I get how you feel. Heck, I myself had my own doubts about Terra in between when she came back to officially join us and when she betrayed us. Believe me, I know how you feel, and I have a feeling so does Raven." As he said that last bit, Robin directed his eyes towards Raven as if to ask for confirmation. The sorceress nodded in the affirmative.

Beast Boy let a nervous smile come on his face. "Thanks dude," he said.

"No problem Beast Boy," Robin stated with a smile. "What are friends for?"

Starfire placed her own hand on Robin's shoulder, smiling in agreement and admiration.

Cyborg then interrupted the tender moment by clearing his throat. Having caught his friends' attention, the partially robotic teenager asked, "So what now?"

Robin thought to himself, turned to face the exit to the storage room with the devil's trap, and said, "Let's get back to the common room and boot up the computers. With what little information we did get, I say the best thing for us to do now is to try to somehow figure out just what that information Slade and the other villain who summoned those things want from Lucifer is."

Beast Boy shuddered, and then asked, "Are you really sure you want to know what that information is?"

"If it's important enough for Slade and this other villain to try to have us killed, it's definitely worth knowing," said Robin. "Come on, we've got some research to do, and I want us to try as hard as possible to find out what the information is before Slade and his compatriot decide to send something worse than what we just exorcised after us."

**And just like that, another chapter is done! I hope you all enjoyed, and that you leave reviews ^_^**

**Coming up next: The titans make their best (albeit unsuccessful) efforts at figuring out just what the information worth their getting killed for is, have a very important discussion over matters of religion, and end up receiving help in their research from a very (and I mean ****_extremely_****) unexpected source (feel free to guess who or what that source is in your reviews and comments).**


	8. Dead Ringer

**Hey ya'll! I hope you're ready for yet more of my awesome story, because here's the newest chapter! In this chapter, the titans make their best efforts at somehow figuring out what the information apparently worth their deaths is, and sadly fail miserably until they receive help from a most unexpected source. Here's to hoping you read, review, and enjoy!**

**Again, I do not own Teen Titans or any other DC universe elements.**

**Chapter 7:**

**Dead Ringer**

At exactly 3:30 that afternoon, none of the Titans had made any progress whatsoever in their efforts to find any information that could even remotely qualify as a possibility for what the information that they were apparently worth getting killed for was. Raven had now gone through almost her entire repertoire of books related to demonology, but she still hadn't yet found anything that seemed like the kind of thing that might have qualified. Robin, Cyborg, and Beast Boy, likewise hadn't had any luck whatsoever on their searches on the internet. Starfire, meanwhile, had no choice but to just sit on the sofa and watch helplessly as her friends did their research. She knew that she would only be in the way as she barely understood the concept they were currently studying, not to mention wasn't exactly the poster girl for computer savviness. The Titans had only stopped once over the course of their efforts to somehow determine what it was that Slade and his as of yet unnamed compatriot had tried to have them killed for, and that had been for a lunch break. But now, even after all their hard work, they still hadn't found anything that had even the most remote chance of qualifying as potential candidates for this element.

Beast Boy yawned, stretched his arms, and then said, "Dude, research can be so exhausting."

"I hear you man," said Cyborg as he continued looking through the website he was currently on. "If I could still feel my joints, they'd probably be swelling up right now."

Robin, meanwhile, found himself feeling very irritated after the website he'd now just finished reading through turned out to be just an online newspaper report about a false doomsday prophet in Star City who'd cried wolf by shouting and raving about an impending apocalypse so that he would distract the public long enough for a gang of robbers who'd hired him to successfully rob a local bank. Slamming his fist on the desk he was using, Robin growled, "There's gotta be some way we can figure out what Slade and this other villain want to find out by having us killed."

"Let me guess," said Beast Boy. "You're not having any more luck at this then we are."

Robin growled. "I just wasted the last five minutes reading a newspaper article on a false doomsday prophet aiding bank robbers in Star City by distracting the public with false announcements of an impending apocalypse; no, I'm not having any luck!"

"Tell me about it," said Cyborg. "The link I accessed right before the one I'm currently on was for a news article about a Halloween prank gone wrong in which a group of teenage hooligans dressed up like demons and scared the bejesus out of a bunch of preschoolers. They ended up getting their cover blown when the chaperones ended up pepper spraying them and nearly beating them to death with mallets before the teenage perpetrators managed to get them to stop and reveal that it was just a prank."

Beast Boy snorted, rolled his eyes, and stated, "I'm not sure which us worse; what you guys just found, or the tabloid article on an eyewitness sighting of Lucifer I just unwittingly stumbled upon."

At this point, Robin facepalmed, groaning in irritation as he felt a horrendous headache coming on. "This is insane!" he yelled. He turned his head to Raven and said, "Raven, I know this is probably a worthless question, but have you found anything in those books that might qualify?"

Raven shook her head, closed the book she'd been looking through at that moment, and said, "Sadly, no. And I have a feeling that I'm not going to any such information in any of the ones that I still haven't yet looked through."

"I certainly wouldn't be surprised," said Beast Boy. "I mean, those demons did say that this information was one of the things that Lucifer only told his five most trusted underlings. I have a feeling that if it's _that_ private, then it sure won't be in any random books, or websites for that matter."

Robin sighed in annoyance. "There's gotta be some way we can figure it out," he grumbled bitterly.

Starfire got up from her seat on the couch, walked up behind Robin, and placed her hand comfortingly on his shoulder. "There, there, Robin," she said. "Don't despair. We will stop Slade and whoever this other villain who's working with him is. We will be victorious."

Robin sighed, looked gratefully at Starfire, and said, "I'm sure you're right Star. Still, I just wish that we could be on equal footing right now with Slade at the very least instead of one step behind him."

"Well I'm sure that if worst comes to worst you could always pray to God himself to help us out," Cyborg grumbled sarcastically in an almost bitter sounding tone.

The other Titans looked at Cyborg with half confused and half worried looks on their faces. "Um, Cy?" Beast Boy asked. "Are you ok?"

"What?" Cyborg asked. Then he noticed the looks on his friends' faces and remembered what he'd just said before now. "Er, sorry, that was nothing. I'm just still having a little trouble wrapping my head around the fact that the demons of Abrahamic religions, and now apparently even Satan himself, are real."

Robin's eyebrow raised, and he said, "Are you sure that's all it is Cyborg? Because you sounded awfully bitter. Is there something about this situation you aren't telling us?"

Cyborg sighed, stared blankly at the computer screen he was sitting in front of, and then exited out of the window he'd been on before turning to face the other titans and responding, "Well I'll admit, the fact that such elements of Abrahamic religion as demons, Hell, and apparently Lucifer himself are real, well now I can't help but wonder if that means that Heaven, angels, and God are real."

The other Titans looked at each other, realized that Cyborg had brought up a valid point, and then looked back at him. "What would be wrong with that?" Beast Boy asked. "I mean, it certainly would be nice to know that there really is someone up there watching over the world, not to mention an afterlife apart from Hell for us to go to when we die."

Cyborg sighed, nodded his head, and said, "I know that, but still, I'm not entirely certain if whether or not God and the angels truly existing isn't just as much a bad thing as it is a good thing."

"What do you mean?" Robin asked.

Cyborg thought to himself, now clearly having trouble deciding just how to word what he was trying to say. "Well, how should I put this . . . well what are your religious beliefs?"

This unexpected question caught the other Titans off guard, and they looked at each other awkwardly before then calmly considering their own religious beliefs.

"Well," said Robin. "I was pretty much born and raised a Protestant by my parents. And in my time under Batman's wing, he made sure to continue my Protestant lifestyle. But I'll also admit that I've regretfully not been to church for a mass since two weeks before I left Batman and came to Jump City, and that was five years ago." Upon mentioning this, a look that appeared half sentimental and half regretful came on Robin's face as he now remembered how large a lapse he'd displayed in his loyalty to his religious faith over the last few years of his life.

Starfire thought to herself, and then stated, "While I am respectful of other religions and have witnessed proof of other religions having elements that are factually in existence, I still consider myself faithful to the native religion of Tamaran, and thus a loyal follower of X'hal."

Cyborg nodded his head in understanding, and then looked at Raven. The sorceress sighed, and responded, "Well, I'm not really overly big on religion. I am half demon after all, and my demon side tends to get a little agitated around religious elements. Still, my human side does have a religious aspect, and in that regard I don't really consider myself to be a deeply rooted follower of any one religion. After all, my mother was a Catholic before Trigon impregnated her with me, and I ended up becoming well versed in the Azarathian religion while in Azar's care. Still, every once in a while, I send a prayer to the Azarathian equivalent of God. After all, despite what my demon side says, I don't want to have to go to Hell when I die any more than you guys do, and I very much doubt you want to go to Hell." The other Titans gulped, and nodded in sympathy.

Then all eyes focused on Beast Boy. The changeling gulped, rubbed his fingers through his hair, and then said, "Well, I'm kind of indifferent to religion really; kind of on the same boat as Raven you know? I mean, my parents raised me as a Catholic, and the Doom Patrol were also devoted followers of that faith. Still, I was also exposed to the religious culture of an upper Lamumban tribe that my parents and I were acquainted with during our adventures in Africa. And with my education and all the life events I've been through ever since I got my powers, I've been exposed to so many different religions both dead and alive that I'm really not sure what faith to turn to. And it certainly doesn't help that it's been five years straight since the last time I attended mass."

Upon saying this, Beast Boy sighed, his ears drooping as he stared downward at the floor with a saddened and seemingly guilt-ridden look on his face. "Still," he then said. "I've always believed that there's at least _something_ out there."

With Beast Boy having now answered Cyborg's original question, the Titans looked back at Cyborg, who sighed, and stated, "Well now that you've made it a little easier by telling me your beliefs, I might as well talk about mine and how they're involved with my current thoughts I've just brought up." He looked out the window at the sun, and then said, "To tell you the truth, I used to be a Catholic just like you BB."

"Used to?" Beast Boy asked.

Cyborg nodded his head, and then said, "Born and raised that way by my parents. But that was before . . . well . . . my accident." The Titans nodded in understanding, for they knew Cyborg well enough to understand that he was referring to the as of yet undescribed to them accident that had caused him to become the partially robotic figure he was now.

"A few days or so after the accident," Cyborg continued. "Well, to put it simply, I more or less became an atheist. And even after the experiences we had with Trigon and his followers, I still more or less remained firm in that mindset until last night and this morning. And now, having now gotten confirmation in the existence of the Abrahamic demons, the Abrahamic form of Hell, and of course now apparently Lucifer, I'm now not sure whether or not it would really be logical or truly possible for me to doubt so easily in the existence of God, Heaven, and the angels. And after all that I've been through in my life, I honestly can't really decide whether or not I should be happy about that or resentful."

"Resentful?" Robin asked.

"That's a powerful word to use," said Raven.

"No kidding," said Beast Boy.

"Please Cyborg," Starfire asked. "Why would you have any reason to possibly feel such hatred for such a joyous possibility?"

Cyborg sighed, hung his head, and then said, "I understand that in some ways it is indeed better than the alternative, and yes part of me is happy about the possibility. But you see, after my accident and the surgery I underwent afterward that allowed me to become what I am now, I more or less convinced myself that I had to believe that there was no such thing as God, or angels, or even Heaven. After all, in light of what had happened to me and my mom both in the accident and in the immediate aftermath that followed, if God and the angels truly didn't exist, then all the stuff that had happened to me would feel more like just a natural part of the chaos that would exist in their place, and less like . . . well . . . like a betrayal."

The other Titan's eyes widened at this choice of words. "Betrayal?" Beast Boy asked in shock. "What do you mean betrayal?"

Cyborg thought to himself, considering whether or not to explain any further, and then sighed. "Might as well," he thought to himself. He looked at his four friends and said, "You know how sometimes early on in life you end up waking up screaming from a nightmare and you have someone to come and comfort you afterward?"

The other Titans nodded. "When my parents were still alive," said Robin, "they comforted me. But of course, after I ended up under Batman's wing, he more or less forced me to just deal with them on my own."

"I had Galfore to comfort me," said Starfire.

"I had Azar," said Raven.

"My parents comforted me after nightmares before they died," said Beast Boy. "And when I was in the Doom Patrol, I remember that Elastigirl would always be there to comfort me after a nightmare, against Mento's orders I might add."

Cyborg nodded, and then explained, "Well before the accident, my mom was practically always the one to comfort me and help me back to sleep. And I remember that directly before she left as I was starting to really get back to sleep, she would say to me as a parting call that angels were watching over me."

The other Titans looked surprised. "Wow," said Robin. "My parents certainly never thought of saying that."

"But I don't understand," said Starfire. "What does this have to do with you feeling as if the angels and God had betrayed you after your accident?"

"Because as far as I know," Cyborg responded, "she was wrong. There was nothing watching over her on the day of the accident, much less over me."

Cyborg turned his head to face the windows again, and then continued, "And even without counting all that, over time after the accident both before and after I came here to Jump City, heck even now, I've always made note of how such terrible things have happened to me, my mom, you guys, other civilians, other heroes, heck sometimes there have even been things I've noticed happen to bad guys that sometimes I end up feeling even _they_ didn't deserve. And with all that in mind, I just can't help but wonder; if God and the angels do exist, then why do they allow such terrible things to happen to good people? Heck, why do they allow bad things to happen, period?"

The other Titans gulped, and hung their heads as they realized how Cyborg had made a powerful point. Eventually, Robin placed his hand on Cyborg's shoulder and said, "Well Cyborg, I'm not sure how else to say this but, sometimes all you can really say is that God, if he exists, truly does work in mysterious ways. And whether or not you view God existing and not being there for you and your mom that day as a personal betrayal is your call. But I personally believe that while I do not believe in fate, God allows bad things to happen to people as his own way of testing us to see how we react. And the ways we react in the face of his tests proves to him whether or not we're worthy of going to Heaven, Hell, or Purgatory.

"I'm sure that it would be awesome if God or his angels were to directly intervene in the world's affairs and help maintain order that way. But I also believe just as firmly that it is specifically to preserve order that they don't directly intervene, assuming they even exist. I mean, you've got to admit, if they intervened directly, it would upset the balance of order and chaos to much in favor of order. And things have to be balanced out really in order for true peace."

Cyborg thought to himself, and then sighed as he grudgingly realized that what Robin said actually made sense. "I guess you're right," said Cyborg. The half-robot teenager sighed again, and then stated, "But boy, does the natural order suck."

Robin chuckled at Cyborg's statement, and then said, "Yes, it sucks. But it is what it is."

Beast Boy chuckled, stretched his arms, and then said, "Well man, I'm sure that whether or not God and the angels truly exist, we'll almost certainly find out what Slade and this other villain guy are after some way or another without having to wait for another set of demons to try to kill us."

All the other Titans apart from Raven laughed at this. But right at that moment, they all heard the unexpected sound of a message being intercepted on the main TV window screen of the common room. Confused, the Titans glanced at the screen in question. At the sight of the sender ID, Robin's eyes narrowed in suspicion, for the ID simply read 'Unknown Source'.

"Wonder who's calling us," said Cyborg.

"Only one way to find out," said Robin, who walked over to the screen and selected the 'accept' option.

In a flash of static, the screen revealed none other than Slade himself sitting in an otherwise empty forest clearing. "Hello Titans," he stated to the shocked teenage heroes.

"Slade," Robin growled, his fists clenched at the sight of the Titan's longtime nemesis.

"I see your thoughts on me haven't changed a bit since the last time," said Slade.

The other Titans glared at the screen alongside their leader. "What do you want, Slade?" Robin snarled.

"Yeah," said Cyborg. "Whatever you're calling us for, it ain't pleasant conservation. Whatever you want, it had better not be a gloat about another assassination attempt on us."

"Relax, tin man," Slade stated calmly. "I'm not here to gloat, much less tell you of any more demons that have been sent after you, particularly since my associate hasn't yet sent any more after you after how you both killed the first five he sent after you and summarily dismissed the rest of the squadron they were with back home."

Slade then directed a glance at Raven and said, "And on that note, very impressive work, Raven. I'll definitely have to admit that you certainly don't seem to have any qualms about exorcisms in spite of your heritage."

Raven snarled, her eyes glowing red and dangerously close to splitting into four, and then ominously growled, "Flattery won't get you anywhere."

Beast Boy snarled, positioned himself as if about to transform into a predator and lunge at the screen, and then said, "Yeah Slade, whatever you want to tell us about, I say you stop wasting time."

Slade's eyebrow seemed to rise under his mask. "All business are we? Very well. I believe you are wondering what it is that Vandal Savage considers having you killed for, am I right?"

Robin raised his hand as if to say 'hold it,' and then stated, "Did you just say Vandal Savage?"

"Why yes I did," said Slade. "For the past year or so, we've had a sort of partnership. Need I ask why you just asked me that question?"

Robin growled, slammed his right fist into his left palm, and said, "I knew that demon's description of your partner sounded familiar."

"Who is this savage vandal?" Starfire asked.

"Not savage vandal," said Beast Boy. "Vandal Savage. I remember Mento once told me about him during my time in the Doom Patrol. He's some sort of big shot cave man villain."

"He's not just a big shot cave man villain," said Robin. "Batman's told me about him. Millions of years ago, when the people of Earth were still in the stage where they hunted woolly mammoths and kept wild wolves for pets, a cave man named Vandar Adg came across a mysterious comet that had fallen from the sky and landed nearby his village. His fellow tribesmen fled from it in fear, but he slept next to it for the sake of the warmth it provided that night. But the radiation and heat from the comet must have some sort of magic in it, because after the night was over and he woke up, he later discovered that he'd both ended up becoming immortal and gained a major boost in intelligence. Ever since then, he's plagued the world at various different time periods and under numerous names in his efforts at taking over the world, but the one name that he's now known as by nearly everyone in the world nowadays is Vandal Savage, a play on his old name from before he was endowed by the comet."

"Very good Robin," said Slade. "Your mentor taught you well, and yes, he is indeed the one fully responsible for sending your earlier house guests after you."

"What do you mean?" Cyborg asked. "Didn't you help?"

"Most certainly not," said Slade with a hint of derision in his voice. "Believe me, I have no idea why I should be credited by you for this, because Savage did all the work in summoning them, and I for one was not 100% on board with the idea."

Robin's eyebrows rose. "You weren't?"

Slade shook his head side to side. "No," responded the Titan's masked nemesis. "We may view each other as enemies, but unlike Savage I respect you; you have always proven worthy opponents after all. And I believe that you deserve better than being slaughtered like animals by a race of beings that serve a higher power too impatient to let the world's story unfold the way it's been planned out. And also, after my experiences with your father, attempting to unleash a second satanic figure on the world is far too despicable, even for me."

At first the Titans were confused by what Slade had said, but then Raven realized who Slade was talking about. "You mean Lucifer."

"Precisely," said Slade. "As I'm sure you might have been informed by those demons you interrogated and sent home this morning, Satan himself is at work once more in his efforts to escape from Hell earlier than foretold. And Vandal Savage has chosen to form a partnership with him in the current plot that has been decided upon. However, Lucifer is careful, and he refuses to tell Savage and I what we'd need to know in order to help him bring this current plot of his to fruition unless we first fulfill one small favor he has chosen to ask of us. And as you have now learned from your recent experiences, that favor has turned out for us to have you killed."

Starfire stepped forward, her eyes glowing green and her fists at the ready to produce star bolts, and said, "Well, what is this information that this cowardly and dishonorable monster wants us dead before he allows you to know it?!"

Slade stared at the angry Tamaranean, and calmly stated, "I cannot tell you directly what it is, for I do need to be mindful of potential eavesdroppers after all; however, I can tell you how you can find out what it is without asking me, Savage, or Lucifer."

The Titans looked at each other, clearly considering whether or not to take Slade up on his offer. Then they all came to a unanimous decision, and they turned to face Slade once more before Robin said, "Alright Slade, we'll take you up on this offer, but don't think that this will change anything between us."

Slade nodded. "I wouldn't have it any other way," he stated before he leaned forward and said, "Seek out the Brotherhood of Dante."

The Titans raised their eyebrows. "The what?" Beast Boy asked.

"Brotherhood of Dante," Slade repeated calmly. "It is a hidden organization of knowledgeable mortals that is dedicated to dealing with demons and all other things of an Infernal, Purgatorial, or Paradisiacal nature."

Raven stared suspiciously at Slade. "I've never heard of this order," she stated.

"Not many people have," Slade responded. "That's why very few ever enter it into a search engine or attempt to actively search for it in other ways."

The masked man then looked directly at all five of the teenage heroes, and said, "But if there's anyone apart from myself, Savage, Lucifer, or one of the five knights of Hell who can tell you what it is that Savage wants to have you killed for, it's them. And right now, I'd recommend that you get to work on searching for them as soon as possible. I have a feeling that Savage will send something far more powerful than the force you exorcised this morning in the very near future."

Slade then proceeded to draw out a small sheet of paper that had what looked like an address written down on it and presented it in full view of the Titans. "This is the address of one of their local headquarters bases. This particular base is located right in Jump City. Can you memorize it?"

Cyborg gazed intently at the address Slade had written down on the piece of paper he was now showing them, almost as if he were scanning it. A few minutes later, the partially robotic teenager nodded, and said, "Got it."

Slade nodded, and then said, "Very well then. I recommend you go there straight away. Farewell Titans. I'm sure that we'll hopefully meet again under slightly less potentially apocalyptic terms."

On that ominous note, Slade ended the transmission, and the TV screen turned back to a window in a flash of static. Robin nodded, turned to face his teammates, and then said, "Alright team, let's get to work. Cyborg, you know where that address he gave us is?"

Cyborg nodded. "City Section 13."

"Same place where I get most of my supernatural artifacts and books," said Raven.

"And the place where I got that wacked out pie," said Cyborg.

"What wacked out pie?" Beast Boy asked.

Robin turned his head to look at the changeling. "Remember Mother Mae Eye?"

"Oh," said Beast Boy. "_That_ pie."

Robin nodded, turned his head so that he was facing all four of his teammates, and then said, "Come on, let's get moving. If what Slade told us just now is to be relied upon, then we need to get there and study up as fast as we can before Savage sends another demonic hit man after us."

**And just like that, another chapter wrapped up! I hope you enjoyed and that you leave a healthy batch of reviews. On another note, I apologize in advance if the scene with Slade turning out to be the unexpected source hinted at in the sneak peek I left at the end of the previous chapter seems overly unrealistic or OOC. But this was the best I could do that would make even a remote bit of sense in my opinion. Feel free to voice your own thoughts on that (as well as on other elements in this chapter, particularly the major discussion the titans had about religion). But hey, like I said, regardless of your views on the whole Slade angle in this chapter, I hope you enjoyed reading this new chapter and that you leave a nice bit of reviews (and believe me, I very much would love to see you leave reviews, even if you are a guest!).**

**Coming up next: The titans travel to the address that Slade has given them and get straight to work in resuming their search for the information they desire, but this time with the entire database of the Brotherhood of Dante at their fingertips.**


	9. Silence in the Library

**Hey there everybody! Ready for more Teen Titanic awesomeness? I certainly hope so, because here's a new chapter! In this chapter, the Titans put the new information given to them by Slade to good use by paying a much needed visit to the local Jump City headquarters of the mysterious Brotherhood of Dante. However, they will not be the only ones paying an unexpected visit. Here's to hoping you read, review, and enjoy!**

**Again, I do not own Teen Titans. Now with that out of the way, onward with the fic!**

**Chapter 8:**

**Silence in the Library**

Half an hour later, the titans found themselves standing in the city block where the address they'd been directed to was located, staring blankly at what appeared to be a dilapidated and ruined warehouse with nonplussed looks on their faces. "This is the Jump City headquarters of the Brotherhood of Dante?" Robin asked in disbelief.

"I don't know what to tell you man," said Cyborg. "My internal GPS says that this is the exact address that Slade gave us."

Robin stared back at the derelict ruins before him, his eyes narrowed, and said, "I knew we shouldn't have trusted Slade. Now we've just gone on a wild goose chase."

"I wouldn't be too quick to dismiss this as a wild goose chase," said Raven. "I can sense a very distinct aura of magic around this area."

Robin's eyebrow rose, and he gestured at the area before hissing, "Well what element of the area could possibly have any magic involved?"

"Dude," said Beast Boy. "Have you forgotten what section of the city we're in? From what I hear, all manner of supernatural stuff is rumored to be kept here. Heck, the very road we're standing on could have some sort of supernatural element connected to it."

"Perhaps maybe this ruined building we're seeing is not what's actually there," Starfire suggested.

The other titans looked at her in shock. "What do you mean?" Robin asked.

Starfire interlocked her fingers together as if she were wringing her hands, and then said, "On my planet, there were some Tamaranean spell casters that I know of who were capable of creating illusions so realistic that one could never know they were illusions until one tried to touch them. Perhaps maybe the ruins that stand before us is just an illusion that's been casted upon this area as a shield to hide this fortress we seek from unfriendly prying eyes?"

Upon hearing this suggestion, the other titans briefly gaped at Starfire with facial expressions that were half shocked and half impressed. "You mean a glamour," said Raven.

Starfire thought to herself. "If such an illusion is called a glamour, then yes," she said.

Robin thought to himself. "It would certainly make sense," the boy wonder said to himself in his mind. He turned to Cyborg and said, "Cyborg, do your eyes have a feature that could allow us to determine whether or not this is truly a glamour?"

"Let me take a look," said Cyborg as he proceeded to fiddle around with his ocular functions. A few minutes later, Cyborg squinted at hard at the apparent ruins in front of him, and then nodded his head before saying, "Yep, definitely a glamour, I can see the real thing now."

Robin and the other titans apart from Cyborg looked at the building in front of them, and then squinted as they began to focus intently on it. Sure enough, a few minutes after they started intently focusing their attention on it, the building appeared to flicker and turn blurry like a hologram before eventually solidifying into the form of what looked like a small temple.

At the sight of this, Robin nodded. "Yep," said the boy wonder. "We're definitely at the right place." He turned to his teammates, gestured towards the building, and then said, "Let's go in."

One by one, the five teenage heroes proceeded to walk up to the doors of the building and enter it. Cyborg even made sure to close the door behind him so that it made an obvious clicking noise as the door settled into its fully closed position. Little did they know that an ominous pair of jet black dragon-like eyes were staring out at where they'd just been from a nearby darkened alleyway. Seconds after the door to the building they'd entered was closed, the eyes narrowed, and an ominous draconic growling noise was uttered by the being they belonged to.

. . . . .

At the sound of the door opening, the man at the front desk located within the main foyer of the building looked up from his paperwork towards the door. While he showed no outward signs of emotion, he was secretly feeling very surprised and honored on the inside to see none other than the Teen Titans now standing inside the local Jump City headquarters of the Brotherhood of Dante.

"Welcome," said the man. "What brings you here?"

The titans walked up to the desk, and Robin leaned up against it to look the man right in the eyes before saying, "This is the local headquarters of the Brotherhood of Dante; am I right?"

The man at the desk briefly allowed a stunned look to pop up in his dark brown eyes before he hastily recovered and calmly responded, "Could be. What do you wish to know?"

Robin took a deep breath, exhaled, and then said, "Alright Mr.," he directed a quick glance at the man's name tag, "Templesmith, the Brotherhood may or may not be aware of this, but Abrahamic demons are at work on a terrible plot. While we don't yet know very much, we know enough to be aware that if the plot they are currently attempting isn't foiled, then they could very well end up causing Lucifer himself to be capable of escaping from Hell and bringing about the apocalypse earlier than originally prophesized."

At the sound of this, the man took on a very clear interest, and he leaned back in his chair before saying, "Well I certainly must admit that this information is certainly unsettling. We haven't heard news of Lucifer making an escape attempt for centuries. How did you find out about this? And better yet, how did you find out about this organization?"

Robin looked at his teammates, silently asking them whether or not to tell the full truth. The sight of the up and down nods they made was enough to convince him of the answer. He looked back at Mr. Templesmith and replied, "You are familiar with us right?"

Mr. Templesmith nodded. "Indeed I am," he responded. "Hard not to be familiar with you considering how you're the local celebrities around here."

Robin nodded, and then said, "Well last night, five demons broke into our tower and attempted to kill us. We were lucky enough to figure out a way to overcome them in the midst of our resulting battle against them, but we then had to set up our tower so that it would be well defended against further demon attacks. This morning, as a result of one of our defense measures, we managed to interrogate the larger force that had sent the five demons that tried to assassinate us before, and from them we learned that they were summoned by two mortal villains who are currently in a partnership with Lucifer himself and have been offered information they need to help aid Lucifer in his current plans in exchange for having us killed."

At the sound of all this, Mr. Templesmith gulped, and then leaned forward with his chin on his hand. "I'll say, you have quite a situation on your hands. Very well, tell me what you want to know."

"I presume you have a location in this building where you store all your documented information on what you deal with?"

"Yes."

"Well we need to access it," said Robin. "If we're to stop whatever this plot of Lucifer's is, we need to know what the information that he offered to give the two villains he's working for in exchange for our deaths is. And I have a feeling that if there's anyone who has a document containing this information, it's this organization."

Mr. Templesmith thought to himself. "The archives are located further within the headquarters, but access to them is only allowed to official members of the Brotherhood of Dante."

"I understand that," said Robin. "But with the current circumstances, now's not the time to follow tradition."

"I really can't allow you to enter . . ."

"Listen," Robin growled as he leaned forward more threateningly towards the Brotherhood of Dante member. "This is serious business we're dealing with, and I'm talking end of the world level serious. The only option we have for figuring out a logical theory of what Lucifer's current plot is short of testing our luck in asking Lucifer, a higher ranking demon, or one of the two villains who are now working with them is accessing your records. And if we don't access them and get ourselves adequately prepared for working to foil this plot by accessing the information in your archives as soon as possible, then the entire world could be overrun by demons, and that's before they somehow figure out a way to bust out Lucifer himself. So what's more important to you right now? Following protocol? Or saving the world?"

Mr. Templesmith gulped, thought to himself, and then nodded his head up and down before saying, "Very well then." He stood up from his desk, gestured towards a hallway that led further into the headquarters, and then said, "Follow me."

The Titans proceeded to follow the Brotherhood of Dante member out of the foyer and further into the headquarters down the hallway they entered. As they made their way through the hallway, the titans began to notice other members of the Brotherhood milling around in the hallway as well. While they all briefly happened to direct a glance at the unexpected guests, not one of them otherwise showed any signs of surprise or emotion at the sight of the titans. "Azar would be very intrigued as to how they were trained," Raven thought to herself.

"I'm sorry if my colleagues seem to be rather rude," said Mr. Templesmith. "From a young age, all members of the brotherhood are trained to masterfully conceal our emotions around strangers. By keeping our emotions hidden, it becomes far more difficult for demons and other beings with mind reading capabilities to latch onto them and use them to their advantage. It also helps in setting up the ideal atmosphere for whenever we happen to make any interrogations."

Robin nodded. "I can see what you mean," he said out loud. Raven also nodded, showing no sign of emotion on her face, but feeling slightly impressed on the inside.

A few minutes later, they reached what looked like a large circular room with a large golden statue depicting what looked like an angel standing on a mountain extending his sword towards a roaring seven headed dragon positioned on the same mountain. Upon closer look, the statue had a plaque that said 'Michael and Lucifer: The Final Battle'.

Upon sight of the titans gaping at this statue, Mr. Templesmith nodded, gestured at the statue and said, "Indeed, this statue depicts the archangel Michael himself doing battle with Lucifer in the midst of the Apocalypse. This same image serves as the emblem of our organization as a reminder for how we stand to preserve the cause of Michael and the rest of Heaven against the followers of Lucifer."

The group came to a stop directly in front of the plaque and statue. Mr. Templesmith turned to face the titans and gestured towards the walls of the room, indicating how there were eight hallways that led in and out of the room, each in a different direction. "This room is considered the inner sanctum and hall of duty, where this statue serves as a reminder of our noble goal. Each of these hallways leads to a different area of the headquarters."

He pointed at the hallway directly behind the titans from which they'd just come. "As you already know from just leaving that hallway, the hallway behind you leads to the main foyer, located in the south wing." Next he pointed at the hallways located to the left and right of the one he and the titans had just exited. "The hallway behind you located to your left leads to our living quarters, and the similar one behind you to your right leads to the mess hall."

Mr. Templesmith then proceeded to point at the hallway entrance located on the exact rightmost side of the room. "This hallway," he began, "leads to our training facilities. In that area, we train for battle and missions." Then he pointed at the hallway entrance located on the exact leftmost side of the room and continued, "Whereas this hall leads to our executive offices and the room where we all gather to hold meetings."

To finish up his explanation of the area, Mr. Templesmith turned his head and gestured towards the three hallway entrances located behind him and the statue. "The hallway to the left among those three leads to the area where all the initiates take their studies. The hallway to the right among these three leads to the workshop where we make our weapons and other items, the lab where we conduct scientific studies, and a sort of miniature museum depicting a collection of our knowledge. Finally," he pointed directly at the hallway entrance in the very center of the area he was indicating and said, "This hallway is the one I am currently going to lead you down, because this is the hallway that leads to our library and archives. At this time, you may now follow me to this area." Upon saying this, Mr. Templesmith proceeded to make his way around the statue and directly towards the hallway he'd indicated to lead to the records hall. The titans followed, eager to get to their destination and begin their work on researching to find the information they'd come for.

Right as they were two footsteps or so away from entering the hallway that led to the library, the titans and their guide heard a voice behind them state, "I see we have visitors." The five teenage heroes and their adult guide turned around and saw another man dressed in what looked like the robes of a priest.

Mr. Templesmith nodded his head, bowing it slightly as if in respect, and then said, "Indeed we do master." He turned to face the titans and gestured towards the newcomer before explaining, "Titans, this is Master Balthazar Novak; he is the head of the Jump City division of the Brotherhood of Dante."

Robin directed a closer look at the man who'd now been introduced. "He certainly looks the part," he admitted to himself in his mind. While the man looked as if he was at around the mid 40's in age, Robin could see the signs of the stress that came with being a major leader. The man's already pale blonde hair was showing signs of becoming a very sickly white, his face appeared to show signs of a haggard and worn look, and Robin could also see a look in the man's eyes that screamed how very weary he was from the pressures and trials that came with his job.

Abruptly realizing that some courtesy in manners was required for this situation, Robin made a polite smile and extended his hand towards Master Novak. "It's an honor to meet you sir," he said. Novak gave a weary smile, and returned Robin's gesture in a firm handshake.

Upon finishing the handshake, Master Novak looked intently at all five of the teenage heroes, and said, "It is certainly unexpected for us to be seeing you here in our headquarters. May I ask to what we owe the pleasure of your presence here? And for that matter, perhaps you'd be so kind as to explain how you found out about us?"

Raven stepped forward. "I know this might sound hard to believe since you might not yet be aware of it yourselves, but very recently, a large number of Abrahamic demons have risen from Hell and walked the Earth. From our recent experiences with them, we have learned that they were serving as pawns in a plot that could eventually allow for Lucifer himself to escape from Hell earlier than apparently prophesized."

Master Novak's eyebrow raised, his steely gray eyes hardening at the news, and he said, "I'll say. This is a very serious situation. How it is you have found out about this news?"

"We learned it from a group of demons we captured when they came to our tower in an attempt to kill us," Robin responded.

At the sound of this, Master Novak's glare softened slightly, for now he had heard solid evidence to the potential truth of what he'd now been informed of. "You heard this from the demons themselves," he stated. "How do you know for certain they were telling the truth? Did they swear on Lucifer's crown?"

"Yes," said Robin. "Not to mention they were under threat of exorcism."

Master Novak closed his eyes, and nodded his head. "Then indeed they were sadly telling the truth. Such a vow is unbreakable if made by a demon. That in mind, the world is indeed at risk of being in very terrible peril." He opened his eyes. "Very well, how can we help?"

"Whoa," Beast Boy stated. "Hold on, you actually believe us?" Belatedly realizing how rude he might have sounded, he lifted his hands up as if in surrender and said, "Don't get me wrong, I'm glad you trust us but, well I wasn't expecting you to believe us that quickly. I mean, considering how secretive you guys are, I'm kind of surprised that you seem so willing to trust relatively complete strangers like us so quickly."

Master Novak nodded, his face showing that he understood, and he said, "A fair point young shape shifter, and indeed we do know the perils of being too quick to trust complete strangers without being given good reason. Fortunately, we have the luxury of knowing for certain whether or not those we are talking to are trustworthy."

Novak lifted up his right arm so that the titans could get a good look at his hand, which they could now see had a platinum ring with an emerald on it. "Contained within this gem," Novak explained, "is a powerful charm that allows the gem to change color in accordance with the level of stress in one's voice. Simply by looking at it while people we are speaking to are talking, we can tell whether or not the people speaking are telling the truth by noting what color the gem is. If the people speaking are telling the truth, then the gem stays green. But if the person is lying, then the gem turns blood red like a ruby. The gem on my ring has remained green for the entire time you've spoken and told me about this escape plot of Lucifer's you've managed to catch wind of, so therefore, I know for a fact that you were indeed telling the truth. And presumably, so did Mr. Templesmith." As if to confirm what his master had suggested, Mr. Templesmith showed the titans his own ring, which also had a gem that was still emerald green.

At the sight of this, Beast Boy nodded his head with an impressed look on his face. "Well that's certainly cool," he thought to himself. He then looked at Robin and said, "Ok Robin, you can go ahead and explain how they can help us now."

Robin nodded, looked at Master Novak, and stated, "Master Novak, one thing that I didn't yet mention already is that the demons that were sent to kill us were not just sent to kill us out of spite, or even directly by Lucifer himself. You see Master Novak, from what we've managed to learn, Lucifer is currently in the midst of a partnership with two human villains we know as Slade and Vandal Savage. While the two of them, or at least Savage anyway, are willing to help him in his current plan, there is one bit of information they apparently need in order to be able to do so that Lucifer is currently refusing to tell them unless they first have us killed. The demons we learned all this from didn't know what that information is, so we're trying to find out what sort of information might qualify. And as far as we can tell, the only source we can turn to apart from Lucifer, a member of his inner circle, or the two villains currently working for Lucifer, is your organization.

"With that in mind," Robin continued, "for the sake of getting ourselves adequately prepared and at work in foiling this plot as soon as possible, my teammates and I wish to directly access your archives and hopefully find out the information we seek from there."

Master Novak thought to himself, and then said, "While I do understand your reasoning, I'm not entirely certain whether or not I should grant this request. As I'm sure Mr. Templesmith has told you, it is unheard of for us to grant direct access to the records to anyone who isn't an official registered member of this Brotherhood."

Robin took a deep breath, exhaled, and calmly responded, "I understand that, but in light of the current circumstances, this small breach of protocol might be the only way to avert a potential apocalypse. Believe me; my teammates and I have already had to deal with the effects of an apocalypse before when Trigon attacked, and I am willing to do anything to prevent a second one from occurring. And I have a feeling that you don't want Lucifer to succeed where Trigon failed any more than I do."

Master Novak sighed, nodded his head in understanding, and responded, "You are right in that regard, but still . . ."

Mr. Templesmith placed his hand on the master's shoulder in a companionable gesture and said, "Let them access the records master."

"Jonah," Master Novak began warningly.

"You heard what they said," said Mr. Templesmith. "And you know they're telling the truth. See your ring? The gem's still green. And besides, they have a point. The Brotherhood of Dante hasn't had to deal with a plot of this magnitude staged directly by Lucifer and his followers, much less with Lucifer himself, for centuries. It would be a miracle for us to find any member or executive alive today who has any experience with this kind of situation, much less one with a mental state sufficiently healthy enough to be of any assistance."

He pointed at the titans. "The last few plots that have been attempted and foiled weren't even foiled through our own efforts. And Lucifer wasn't even directly at the helm of the events that unfolded for those plots. Besides, when Trigon rose, the Teen Titans were able to fight him off and defeat him long after the entire Brotherhood of Dante had been turned to stone by his presence. If there's anyone who can help us foil this newest plot of Lucifer's, it's them. Trust me, this breach of protocol they ask of us will be a small price to pay."

Novak thought to himself some more, and then sighed, nodded his head up and down with his eyes closed, and stated, "I don't like this; but if the world's safety depends on it, then so be it."

"You mean?" Starfire asked.

"Yes," said Novak. "I shall allow you to directly access our library right now." He turned to face the entrance to the hallway that would lead to the library. "Come," he stated. "Let us head there straight away. We've got no time to lose."

. . . . .

Meanwhile, back outside the headquarters, the hidden figure that had watched the titans enter the building from a hiding place in a nearby alleyway was now standing about a foot or two from the front door. The being, a large black demon, was glaring intently at the door with its eyes narrowed to the point that its pupils were now even more slit-like than usual. It snarled, licked its chops, and growled silently to itself, "This is definitely the Jump City fortress of the Brotherhood of Dante. Whoever allowed for the titans to come here certainly knew what he or she was talking about."

"Master?" came a voice behind the black demon from a slightly higher elevation. "Is there anything to report?"

The black demon turned its head and lifted it up sufficiently to look directly at the being who'd spoken. The being in question was easy to recognize as a standard Luciferian wind demon with its purple scales and eyes, purple-feathered wings that served as arms, taloned bird-like feet, serrated beak-like mouth, tuft of purple feathers on its head, and long tail with another tuft of purple feathers at the tip. Unlike the black demon, this demon was about a foot or so shorter. As for why the black demon had to look up at it, the wind demon was currently perched on the edge of a balcony that adjoined with a room on the second floor of an abandoned and dilapidated apartment complex.

The black demon grunted, pointed at the apparent ruins that stood directly in front of it, and said, "Indeed there is Imbix. In fact, I have managed to stumble upon two treasures at once. The Teen Titans are definitely here, and better yet, I now have reason to believe that this building is in fact one of the many headquarters bases of the Brotherhood of Dante."

The wind demon's eyes widened, and it took all its willpower not to squawk in delight. "That's . . . that's excellent news."

"Indeed," said the black demon, who looked back at the doors to the building and said, "If this building truly is what I think it is, then I now have the opportunity to both eliminate the Teen Titans and to deal a powerful blow against the Brotherhood of Dante."

"Well what are we waiting for?" the wind demon squawked. "Let's get it done!"

The black demon raised its right hand as if to signal to stop right as its underling was about to take to the air. "No Imbix. Not yet. I'm waiting for the right moment to strike. And besides, my first priority is to take out the Teen Titans. If there is time after that task is done, then maybe I will stay to wreck further havoc on this base; but the titans come first. And on that note," he looked back at Imbix, "when I go inside to battle the titans, I will be doing it alone."

Imbix pouted. "You always get all the fun," he warbled bitterly.

"I'm serious Imbix," the black demon growled. "Stay put. I can't allow for the risk of someone seeing you flying around in the sky and causing a citywide panic. You know that his Malevolence doesn't like it when we bring widespread attention of mortals to ourselves before he's deemed it to be the proper time."

Imbix glared at his superior and hissed, "Well if you'd just let me go in there with you, then maybe I'd be sufficiently entertained enough to not stray from hiding to seek entertainment."

"I've already told you," said the black demon. "Your assistance won't be necessary. I'm powerful enough that I should be more than capable of taking on those five children alone without much effort. And even if I did need your assistance, I still wouldn't be able to bring you with me. In case you haven't noticed, this building has been built on hallowed ground. Of the two of us, I'm the only one who can so much as place a single foot on the floor of that building. Sure you can fly over it, but it will be physically impossible for you to even enter the building, much less set one of your feet on the floor."

At the sight of the deepening mixture between a glare and a pout on the wind demon's face, its superior sighed, and then said, "Look, I'll compromise. When I do battle with the titans, it will be in the library; and I know for a fact that the libraries in these headquarters always have reinforced glass roofs. As long as you stay above the roof, and thus within the glamour, you are free to watch me battle the titans through the roof and entertain yourself that way. Savvy?"

Imbix thought to himself, his head at an angle indicating his being deep in thought. Then he nodded. "Fair enough," he stated.

"Good," said the black demon. He turned his head to look back at the hidden local headquarters of the Brotherhood of Dante, and then said, "Now you wait right here while I scope the area to try to locate the library. When I'm about to do battle with the titans, I'll give you a signal and you can fly right over to take your seat for the show. But remember, do not attempt to intervene. Even if you do manage to break the glass of the roof, the warding won't let you enter; believe me I know."

. . . . .

"You don't seem to have very much security," said Cyborg.

Master Novak chuckled, and said, "Appearances can be very deceiving young warrior. I'll admit, we don't have any of the big fancy security technology that you have in your tower, much less the everyday gadgets that make up most mundane security systems these days. But trust me, this building, and all others that serve as headquarters for divisions of this brotherhood are much tougher nuts to crack than they might appear at first glance."

"How?" Beast Boy asked.

"Well for one," Master Novak replied. "All of our headquarters buildings are shielded from the sight of civilians and other humans who aren't considered official members or don't look hard enough by glamours. Since most people rarely ever look at glamoured objects hard or long enough, they almost never see our headquarters bases for what they really are."

Beast Boy made a silent 'oh' upon being reminded of how the headquarters was shielded from sight by a glamour, nodded his head, and then said, "That's true."

Master Novak nodded. "Also," he continued, "we have several security measures in place for keeping out unwanted demon visitors."

He pointed at the floor and stated, "For example, this building, and all our other headquarters bases are built on hallowed ground."

Raven nodded her head upon hearing this. "Definitely a smart idea," she stated. The other titans looked at her as if asking what she meant. "Hallowed ground has a similar effect on demons as iron boundaries. For the majority of demons, it's physically impossible for them to step foot on hallowed ground. But unlike with iron, demons can fly over hallowed ground. And also, unlike iron, hallowed ground only works on minor demons. Higher ranking demons, particularly knights of Hell, are able to enter hallowed ground without any difficulty."

"Indeed you are correct," said Master Novak. "Fortunately, we also have magical wards on the building that are designed to keep out all manner of demons from both low and high ranks. Admittedly though, I'm not entirely certain as to whether or not they're powerful enough to keep knights of Hell at bay. And believe me, I've tried my hardest to get my superiors at the Brotherhood headquarters in Jerusalem to give their consent for an upgrade in the warding, but I highly doubt that they're all that keen on granting that privilege just yet in light of how long it's been since the brotherhood's last encountered a knight of Hell."

At the sound of this, Beast Boy gulped, and anxiously looked behind him. While he still wasn't entirely an expert yet on the high ranking demons that were apparently known as knights of Hell, he was now starting to get the feeling that in light of what he'd heard said about them combined with how difficult it had been to battle the minor ranking demons he'd already encountered, he did not want to meet a knight of Hell at any time in the near future.

Sometime later, Master Novak said, "Here we are."

The Titans looked ahead and saw that they'd reached a set of double doors that appeared to have a pair of lightning bolts engraved on them. As the Titans watched, Mr. Templesmith proceeded to walk up to what appeared to be some sort of electronic lock and press on the numerical buttons as if entering in a code. Second later, with an electronic beep, the doors opened, revealing a large library.

Mr. Templesmith stepped to his right, gestured towards the open doors, and said, "Step this way, and you may begin your work."

Rendered speechless by the sight of the enormous library, the titans entered, looking carefully around the room. "I'll say," said Robin. "We sure have a lot of books to look through."

He turned to face Master Novak and Mr. Templesmith. "Which section do you think will be the most likely location for a book containing the information we're looking for?"

"Section X," said Master Novak. "But I'd recommend you take a look at our online database on the computer first; it's faster, and we also have a chapter in there devoted entirely to both confirmed and theorized escape plans of Lucifer. Granted, this current plan of his at work might not be in there, but it's a start."

Robin nodded, bowed his head in respect, and then turned to face the other titans before saying, "Come on team; let's move."

"Wait."

The titans turned their heads to face Master Novak. "The password is Beatrice," said the Brotherhood leader.

"Beatrice, got it," said Robin. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," said Master Novak. He turned away and said, "Come on Mr. Templesmith, let us leave our guests to their work." The two adult men proceeded to walk away. But Mr. Templesmith made a point to direct a wave at the titans as if to say 'good luck' before the doors closed.

Robin faced the other titans and said, "You heard him team. Let's get to work." In a flash, the five teenage heroes made their way over to the computer, which they could see lying right near the very back of the library. Upon reaching the computer, Beast Boy hopped up on the seat in front of it while the other titans gathered around him to watch over his shoulders.

At a speed that left Cyborg gaping in shock, Beast Boy typed in the password that had been given by Master Novak, and the main menu of the Brotherhood of Dante's electronic database came up on the screen. "Alright guys," said Beast Boy. "We're in. What should we look through first?"

"Start at the beginning," said Robin. "As proven from last night and this morning, we're nowhere near as familiar with these enemies as we ought to be. It's best we start at the beginning and continue on from there so that all five of us can be up to speed instead of having to always rely on Raven; no offense."

Raven nodded as if to say 'none taken,' her face as blank as ever.

"Beginning it is then," said Beast Boy. He clicked on the link that said 'Prologue.' The main menu screen changed to a prologue page, which the titans proceeded to read. Not one of the titans made a sound as they silently read the document that would begin their current quest for knowledge.

. . . . .

At exactly 7:00 pm, the titans had managed to read a surprisingly large portion of the database. And as would be expected, they'd learned quite a lot of information that they'd never would have suspected.

"To think that The Divine Comedy was in fact a true story and we didn't even know," Robin said to himself.

"You can say that again," said Beast Boy. "Man, Dante must have had some serious balls to willingly undertake such a journey."

Robin nodded in agreement. "Makes me wonder if he felt the way I felt when I traveled alongside Slade to search for Raven when Trigon was here," he stated.

"Don't remind me," said Beast Boy.

At the sound of the slightly jealous and bitter tone in Beast Boy's comment, Robin directed a glance at the green boy from out of the corner of his eyes with his left eyebrow raised. Seconds later, after thinking calmly to himself, he decided to let the matter drop for the moment. "I'll worry about this later," he thought to himself. "Right now, we've got more important things to worry about."

"I'll certainly admit that it was very informative to read all that stuff in there on demons, angels, and their respective afterlife realms," Raven stated. "And I will definitely say that it was very helpful in boosting my understanding of their respective hierarchies as well."

"Don't forget what it said in there about Purgatory," Cyborg stated. He looked at the computer screen and said, "I sure as Hell was taken by surprise when I learned about those things called Primordials. I know for a fact that the Bible never mentioned them."

The other titans nodded in agreement, for that particular bit of information Cyborg had mentioned had proven just as much of a surprise for them as it had for their partially robotic friend. According to the Brotherhood of Dante's database, the Primordials had been the very first animals God had created after allowing for the actual planet Earth and solar system itself to come into existence. However, in spite of how Lucifer had apparently found them to be very entertaining creations, God himself had eventually come to label them as too dangerous to coexist alongside any of his future creations after observing their violent and savage behavior that far exceeded what he wished to be present in any of his future creations. And as a result, he'd created Purgatory and locked them all away in there.

Over time, Purgatory had come to eventually become a place for the souls of those who'd been neither good enough for Heaven nor bad enough for Hell to go to after death where they could overtime prove themselves worthy of being transferred to either of the other two afterlife realms. As for the Primordials themselves, they had ended up getting themselves both a job and a partial source of food as a result of God's allowing for souls to come to Purgatory. The job was that they would serve as a Purgatorial 'police force' of sorts. And as for food, the concept was that as long as the souls in Purgatory followed the rules of battle properly according to the regulations of Purgatory, the Primordials would satisfy their hunger by eating purgatorial beasts; on the other hand, if the souls got overly violent, repeatedly violated the rules of the Purgatory battles, or attempted to escape, then the Primordials would eat them and thus cause them to cease to exist for all eternity.

Beast Boy soon shuddered at the memory of the information on Primordials. "I can definitely say that I'm glad the Big Man upstairs had the sense to lock them away in Purgatory before he created humans and all the other animals that exist now. I certainly wouldn't any creature as savage as those things roaming the Earth. After all, judging from their description, I'm thinking that even the Beast would be horrified by them."

"Correct you are," he heard the Beast say in his mind. "Those things you now speak of are much too vile, even by _my_ standards." Beast Boy made no sign of having heard the Beast.

"And while I'm at it," said Beast Boy. "I'm sure Robin found all that information we've gathered on the knights of Hell and Lucifer himself worth coming here for."

"You can say that again," said Robin. "And I'll definitely admit that it was nice of the Brotherhood of Dante to have their names written down in here. Believe it or not, I actually recognize the names of all five of those demons from my religious teachings. As for Lucifer," he shuddered, and then continued, "I hate to say this, but I'm seriously hoping that we won't ever have to encounter him in our lifetimes. Trigon was bad enough."

"No kidding," said Cyborg. "But on another note, when I go to Heaven, God and the angels are going to have a lot of explaining to do."

Robin sighed mentally upon hearing this. He'd had a feeling that all this studying wouldn't help Cyborg feel any better about his personal crisis of faith. Making a note to think about it some more later, he said to Beast Boy, "Is there anything else you think would be useful to look through before we go home?"

Beast Boy pointed at a link and said, "It says to see this section for further information on Lucifer's escape plots."

"Access it," said Robin.

Beast Boy clicked on the link, and thus opened up a document that contained information about confirmed (and foiled) escape plots of Lucifer that had occurred in the past as well as multiple theories of potential plots to be attempted in the future. Upon sight of this, Robin placed his hand on Beast Boy's shoulder and said, "May I sit here?"

Beast Boy got up, and Robin sat down on the chair before beginning to intently read through the document. As he read, he couldn't help but whistle as he found himself learning some very surprising information about how multiple major events that had occurred in the world both during his lifetime and before then had been connected in some way to Lucifer and his efforts at escaping Hell without hardly anyone even knowing about his personal involvement. In fact, according to the section with the confirmed plots, Lucifer had even apparently been partially involved with Trigon's efforts at the apocalypse two years ago.

"Dang," said Beast Boy. "I so didn't see that coming."

"Speak for yourself," said Raven.

"I must admit," said Starfire. "Learning how this monster has been involved in so many events without our knowledge makes me feel most uncomfortable."

"I'm certainly not surprised," said Cyborg. "But for now, the important thing for us to worry about is whether or not any of these theories the brotherhood has on potential future plots could possibly involve the information that Vandal Savage wanted us killed for."

In that instant, right before Robin could resume his reading of the document, the titans all heard an ominous hollow voice from behind them hiss "That is a secret for me to know and you to never find out."

Startled, the five teenage heroes turned their heads to look behind them, only to find that there appeared to be nothing behind them. At the sound of hollow laughter that split the air seconds later, Beast Boy tapped into his animal instincts and senses, Raven tapped into her empathic sensing, and Cyborg began scanning the area. Beast Boy growled, and said, "I can sense that there's someone here, but I can't say for certain where."

"Whatever this thing is," said Raven. "It's in the area, but I can't fully pinpoint its exact location."

Cyborg didn't even have a chance to say anything before the titans suddenly felt what appeared to be a strong breeze blowing around them through the library. And as the five teenage heroes reflexively positioned themselves as if to shield themselves from the force of the wind, they noticed that their shadows, and also those produced by all the bookshelves and other objects in the library appeared to be flowing like rivers towards the very center of the library, where a large vortex of shadowy energy had now formed right on the floor. Fueled by the shadows merging together to allow it to form, the vortex expanded until it completely covered the Brotherhood of Dante emblem illustration engraved on that part of the floor.

As the titans watched, the ground suddenly started shaking beneath their feet, and a large dark figure slowly rose from the vortex. Its clawed hands were the first to rise up from the shadowy portal, followed by its dragon-like head and the rest of its body before finally ending with the tip of its long fur tufted tail. The portal closed and vanished from sight when the creature's tail was a foot or so off the ground, and the being landed softly on the floor on its feet.

The titans barely had a chance to fully process the fact that an unexpected intruder had now appeared in the library right in front of them before it lifted its head up to look directly at them, its ominous black eyes agleam with pleasure and its teeth bared in a snarl of predatory glee. "Hello Titans."

**And just like that, another chapter is over. And for that matter, major cliffhanger! Dun, dun, dun! On that note, I hope you enjoyed this chapter nonetheless and that you leave a nice healthy batch of reviews (and I especially recommend that you guys review, even if you are a guest!). Feel free to comment on whatever you wish to comment on in your reviews and feedback to. I especially hope you enjoyed my introduction of the Brotherhood of Dante. I feel very proud of myself for how I did on them. And I especially hope you're looking forward to figuring out how things go between the epic battle to come between the titans and their unexpected demonic assailant (and for that matter, care to guess just what sort of demon this particular demon is in regard to the hierarchy of Hell?). Again, I hope you enjoyed this and are looking forward to the next chapter to come!**

**Coming up next: The Titans find themselves fighting one of their toughest battles yet against the powerful demon that has now arrived in the library with them. Can the titans successfully hold their own against their newest opponent? Find out, in the next chapter!**


	10. Abaddon

**Hey ya'll! I hope you guys are all ready for some more Teen Titanic awesomeness, because here's a brand new chapter! In this new addition to the story, the Titans find themselves fighting an epic battle against the powerful demon that has now unexpectedly appeared in the Brotherhood of Dante library with them. Can the titans prevail? Or will this demon be villain that they cannot defeat? Prepare to find out, in this epic new chapter!**

**Before we get started on this chapter, let me just remind you guys again that I own neither Teen Titans, nor any other elements of the DC universe. And I certainly don't own the demon featured in this chapter (and for that matter, I apologize in advance if I accidentally cause any religious offense). Now, without further ado, onward with the fic!**

**Chapter 9:**

**Abaddon**

For what seemed like an eternity, the Titans and the large demon that had unexpectedly appeared in the library with them remained standing where they were, facing each other intently. As the titans gazed at the demon now standing before them, Robin carefully made note of as much information as he could gather. In regard to its tail design, head adornment, and the color of its eyes and scales, it looked no different from any of the other Abrahamic shadow demons that the titans had encountered the previous night and this morning.

However, upon closer inspection, it didn't take long for Robin to determine that this demon was very different from the demons that they'd already dealt with before. Unlike all the minor-league Abrahamic demons they'd encountered, this demon seemed to radiate power and authority, almost as if it were demanding both respect and fear at the same time. And as if to further add to this image, while all the minor demons the titans had encountered so far had all been roughly around the same size range as them, this demon was the exact same size as Slade himself.

The demon chuckled, licked its chops hungrily, and then stated, "I must say, for a supposedly minor threat, you've certainly proven quite an annoyance for my client. But no matter, I will most certainly succeed where all those wannabes he sent after you before failed; of that, I can assure you."

Finally regaining her voice, Starfire pointed at the large black demon and shouted, "You will not succeed."

"Yeah!" Cyborg yelled. "Heck, you shouldn't even be in here! This is hallowed ground!"

At the sound of that comment from Cyborg, Raven and Beast Boy looked each other in the eyes nervously. They had a very bad feeling that they knew how this demon had apparently managed to get in to the building without being phased by the fact that it was built on hallowed ground.

Sure enough, the demon chuckled, lifted his left hand up in a dismissive gesture, and said, "That may work in the minor leagues, but as I'm sure you might have already been told by that goody-goody Novak, you need something much stronger than that to keep out higher ranking demons, especially ones like me."

At the sound of this, a hard eyed glare came on Beast Boy's face, and he pointed his finger at the demon before shouting, "You're a knight of Hell aren't you!?"

"Very good young shape shifter," said the demon. "It seems that you are not quite as stupid as I was led to believe."

The knight of Hell turned its head so that it was once again placing equal visual focus on all five of the titans as opposed to just on Beast Boy, and then said, "And since you lot now seem to be entirely familiar on how high ranking I am, I might as well introduce myself properly."

The demon raised its clawed hands up in the air as if to show himself off and roared proudly, "BEHOLD! I AM ABADDON, DEMON OF THE PIT, BRINGER OF DESTRUCTION, KNIGHT OF HELL, AND CHOSEN CHAMPION OF LUCIFER!"

Robin's eyes narrowed. "I remember reading about you in the bible," he stated. "You certainly didn't get mentioned very often."

"Indeed," the demon stated, its tone clearly showing that it wasn't entirely pleased with this information. "But it matters not how I didn't get the attention I deserved in the Bible. All that matters now, is that I'm going to be the knight of Hell who gets the honor of personally sending you to the afterlife."

Robin glared, pointed at Abaddon, and stated, "I wouldn't be too confident about that. The minor leaguers that came after us before you more or less said the same thing, and we were able to handle them just fine."

"True," said Abaddon. "I will admit, you five children have proven yourselves to be far more formidable then my client, Vandal Savage, originally thought. After all, he may have had the confidence to dismiss the situation as a minor setback when last night's advance party never returned to our campsite last night, but when he caught the news from Lucifer about how you'd managed to send the rest of the squadron he'd been granted back to Hell this morning, well I must say that you certainly gave him a gray hair or two. In fact, you've also made Lucifer quite impressed. He truly wasn't expecting you to live past turn of day last night, and he's certainly feeling happy that you've turned out so tough that he's ended up having to grant Savage permission to send a knight of Hell after you."

The demon then proceeded to clasp its hands together so that its clawed fingers intertwined, and then stretch its arms upward into the air before saying, "And to be honest, I'm quite happy to finally get the chance to get back in the game. I'm sure it wouldn't be surprising for you that it's been Hell knows how long since me or any of my four compatriots have been called upon to handle a situation for Lucifer. With that in mind, I'm sure you will understand that I'm very much looking forward to battling you."

"Well I hope you're ready for a disappointment," said Cyborg. "Because from what you just said, I have a feeling you'll be pretty out of practice. And it's never good for someone who's out of practice in battling."

Abaddon chuckled, and then stated, "On the contrary, even without having been sent on many missions for quite a few decades or so, all of the knights of Hell, I myself included, have made sure to constantly train ourselves for battle every day in Hell. So needless to say, I haven't softened up in the slightest, and you will definitely be satisfied in fighting an opponent at full strength and skill."

Robin's eyes narrowed. "Prove it," he growled.

Abaddon grinned smugly at Robin, lifted its right hand up in the air, and then snapped its fingers. In a flash, a gigantic bolt of pitch black lightning struck the floor literally one centimeter in front of Robin. The boy wonder just managed to catch a brief glimpse of the bolt of shadow lightning before it vanished seconds later. To say that Robin was startled would have been an epic understatement. The other titans were likewise stunned speechless by this horrifying display of power. Even Raven was visibly shocked.

Abaddon laughed at the sight of the five bewildered teenage heroes, pointed his clawed right middle finger at Robin and jeeringly hissed, "You should pay more attention to the weather report before flying little bird; it looks to me like there's a storm coming." He laughed again at his joke.

Robin glared at the laughing demon, pointed his own right middle finger at it, and yelled, "Well you may not be a pushover, but we're still not going to go down against the likes of you without a fight! And that's assuming the Brotherhood of Dante doesn't come charging in here to help us!"

"Ah yes," Abaddon chuckled. "Thanks for reminding me about that."

The demon snapped its fingers, and a nearby lock pad became engulfed in shadow energy. A minute or two later, at the sound of an electronic beep, the shadow energy faded away, the screen on the lock pad turned from green to red, and the silence was emphatically shattered by the abrupt blaring roar of an alarm. The titans had just barely realized that they were now hearing alarms going off before they heard what sounded like an immensely heavy object slamming on the floor directly on the other side of the doors to the library.

"There," Abaddon hissed in pleasure as it glanced at the doors and lock pad. "Now we'll have no need to worry about the Brotherhood of Dante ruining our fun."

The demon looked back at the titans, spread his arms out as if to gesture for them to behold his awesomeness, and said, "As you can now see and hear, I've just now gone ahead and triggered this building's emergency lockdown. That slamming noise you heard coming from the other side of the doors? That was the sound of the consecrated marble walls decorated with warding runes slamming down in front of every door in this entire building. As long as the emergency lock-down mode remains in effect, absolutely no one will be entering or leaving whatever rooms or hallways they happened to be in before the lock-down mode was triggered. The only way to manually turn it off without waiting for the threat, in this case me, to leave the building is to enter the override code into the central core supercomputer located in the computer room. And as my luck would have it, there is conveniently absolutely zero people in that particular room. So in other words, you can say goodbye to any hope of receiving professional reinforcements."

The titans looked at each other. It was clear that they would have to take care of this enemy on their own just like usual. Abaddon laughed, stood up to full height, and calmly announced, "Enough talk! It is time for our battle to begin! And as for that plan of Lucifer's that you shall soon be prevented from foiling, all you need to know is that my client has spent the last three months two steps ahead of you! All he needs is a single key element, emphasis on key, and the world will have until exactly two days from now to wait before all Hell literally breaks lose!"

The second Abaddon finished shouting that last phrase, he abruptly thrusted his right hand forward, and a tractor-sized orb of shadow energy burst from his hand and came flying at the five teenage heroes.

. . . . .

Robin just barely managed to yell, "Titans go!" before he and the other Titans lunged off in random directions just in time to avoid getting blown to bits by Abaddon's blast. The computer, however, was not so lucky, and the shadow ball plowed into it with enough force to cause a respectable sized explosion. When the smoke and lingering shadow energy cleared, a smoldering circular patch of ashes was all that remained of the computer.

At the sight of this, Robin whistled from the spot where he'd landed between two bookshelves, and he stated, "For a Biblical minor character, he sure is powerful."

He turned his head to get a closer look at Abaddon once more, and his eyes narrowed before he said, "We'll just have to find out the hard way how much light it's gonna take to light him up."

The boy wonder then shouted, "Titans, surround him," before lunging at Abaddon with his right leg positioned so as to give him a flying ninja kick.

Abaddon was quick to react, and he grabbed the flying boy wonder by his right ankle when the leg in question was seconds from smacking right into his face. All of one second passed before Abaddon took advantage of his newfound position of dominance in his current struggle with Robin by lifting him upward. Robin had just enough time to shriek in surprise before Abaddon then swung him through the air to the left and slammed him downward onto the floor. Before long, the demon proceeded to repeat the process four more times, alternating from right to left as he did so. After slamming Robin on the floor for the fifth time in a row, Abaddon lifted him up in the air again, spun him around four loops, and then let go of his ankle directly after finishing the fourth loop. As a result, the boy wonder was sent flying head first towards the doors to the library.

Fortunately, Robin was positioned close enough to the floor for him to halt his head on flight towards the doors by tapping the floor with his right fingers. Having turned his head on flight into a somersault, he proceeded to further reduce his speed and impact with the floor by making three somersaults across the floor before coming to a far more pleasant backwards landing that allowed him to skid gently to a stop on his hands and feet while facing Abaddon.

Abaddon was just about to tense up to lunge at Robin when he heard Cyborg yell from behind him, "Heads up!" Abaddon turned to face Cyborg just in time to see the cybernetic teenager fire a blast from his sonic cannon at him. The knight of Hell just barely managed to deploy a force field of shadows around himself in time to deflect the sonic laser upward. The blast hit the center of the reinforced glass roof, and ended up being deflected in random directions across the roof as a result before eventually hurtling downward back at Cyborg.

Cyborg ducked just in time to avoid getting zapped by his own sonic blast, and the laser blasted a nearby bust of Master Novak into dust. Cyborg managed to look behind him at the obliterated remains of the bust and say "Oops," in his mind before he heard Abaddon growl. Cyborg looked back at Abaddon just in time to see the demon, with his shield now gone, slam his right fist on the floor. Seconds later, before Cyborg even had a chance to blink, he was abruptly engulfed in a gigantic pillar of shadow energy that erupted from the floor directly underneath his feet. A few minutes later, the pillar faded away in time to reveal Cyborg hurtling upward towards the roof of the library, which he slammed into with a bang.

Cyborg had time to groan before he came plummeting down on his back on the floor. No sooner had he managed to get his eyes fully opened when he saw none other than Abaddon standing right by his head looking down at him. Smirking, the demon extended his right hand so that it was hovering palm-side down over Cyborg's face. "It took me only a minute to reprogram the security system so that this building would go into lock-down mode," Abaddon stated. "Considering how you are also a machine, perhaps I ought to see how long it will take for me to reprogram you into fighting alongside me." At the sound of this, Abaddon's eyes narrowed to the point that his pupils resembled such thin slits as to make him look pupilless, and his hand hovering over Cyborg's face began to glow with black energy.

Fortunately, before Abaddon could activate his 'reprogramming,' he suddenly felt something crash into the back of his head. Abaddon's eyes, now back to normal, narrowed in a mix between irritation and disappointment. Being a masterful wielder of shadow energy himself, he could recognize the feeling of shadow energy on his skin, and thus he immediately knew who had blasted him. He turned around to face the area behind him and saw, as he'd suspected, Raven hovering nearby.

Abaddon smirked, chuckled, and hissed derisively, "You think _that_ will stop me? You of all beings should know how useless such an attack is against a being who uses similar attacks. No one can fight fire with fire, and you cannot defeat darkness with darkness daughter of Trigon."

Raven growled, her eyes narrowed in anger, and her hands glowing with her own shadow energy, and then yelled, "Watch me try!"

In a flash, she raised up her hands and yelled, "Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos!" Upon shouting out her mantra, Raven swiped her hands in an x-shaped slash, and what appeared to be a mysterious rune made out of shadow energy was formed. Abaddon had just enough time to catch the slightest glimpse of the rune before a gigantic beam of blinding white light was fired out from the center of the large rune. The beam engulfed Abaddon and then eventually vanished with a bang in time to reveal him being sent flying backward.

The demon slammed into a wall and landed on his belly nearby the ashes that remained of the computer. As he got on his hands and knees and lifted his head to look at Raven with a growl, the sorceress calmly stated, "That's what happens when you end up on the wrong side of an Azarathian holy light rune. When summoned, this rune causes a blast of angelic light to be fired out from it to smite all evil in its path."

Abaddon snarled, got up on his feet, and hissed, "Clever. But not clever enough!"

No sooner had Abaddon yelled that last phrase when with a wave of his hands, he caused three massive cables that looked as if they'd originally provided power to the computer to rise from the floor, electricity crackling at the tips. At the sight of Raven's stunned look, Abaddon growled, clenched his fists, and yelled, "My combined nature as both a demon and an umbrakinetic might make me susceptible to holy light! But let's see if your similar nature allows you to fare any better against electricity!"

In a flash, Abaddon waved his left hand forward, and the gigantic cable to his left proceeded to rear up like a snake and then slam its electricity crackling tip down towards Raven like a scorpion's tail. Raven just barely managed to hover out of the way before the cable end jabbed down on the floor right where she'd been before. The sorceress didn't even have a chance to catch her breath before Abaddon caused the cable to his right to do the exact same maneuver, forcing her to dodge again. And for the next few minutes that followed, Raven found herself hurriedly and continuously dodging the three cables as Abaddon caused them to strike out at her again and again in random directions.

After a while, Raven found herself in a position in which she was hovering directly over the circle of ashes that was left of the computer that the three cables had originally provided power to. Abaddon snarled in anger as he found himself glaring at the daughter of Trigon. "She certainly has stamina, I'll give her that," he growled to himself in his mind. But then he remembered an important detail that had influenced his original choice to have just the three cables he'd used to rise up from the floor, and his snarl turned into a wolf-like grin. At the sight of this, Raven prepared herself, for she had a feeling that that look meant that Abaddon had a nasty trick up his sleeve. Seconds later, with a backwards wave of his right hand, Abaddon caused all three of the cables between himself and Raven to arch up like snakes. Upon seeing this, Raven reflexively summoned a shadow barrier large enough to shield herself from the front.

Unfortunately, this had been exactly what Abaddon had hoped Raven would do, and with an upwards crescent-shaped swing of his left hand and arm, he caused a fourth cable to rocket out of the floor and diagonally upwards towards Raven from behind, and the electricity enshrouded end jabbed her right on the back. The sorceress let out an unearthly howl of agony as she felt the electricity crackle across her back. Seconds later, with a groan of pain and exhaustion, Raven's shield faded away, and she fell down onto the floor.

No sooner had Raven been brought down on the floor when Abaddon caused the cables to lower back down into the floor and he jumped over to her before grabbing her by the throat and lifting her up so that he could look her right in the eyes. Raven's eyes widened in shock, and she panted in a mixture of fear and shortage of breath at the sight of the smug dragon-like face of Abaddon staring her right in the eyes.

Abaddon chuckled, tightened his grip on Raven's throat slightly, and then said, "You are powerful, I'll give you that; but there's only enough room in the apocalypse for one antichrist, and I'd sooner die then let you steal that role from a rightful future child of Lucifer!" With a growl, Abaddon lifted up his left hand, his claws extended as if he were about to thrust them into Raven's heart.

Fortunately for Raven, help came for her right that very instant in the form of a strong, powerful, and now very angry green lion that lunged onto Abaddon's back and dug its claws into his shoulders and the small of his back. Abaddon howled in pain, and he let go of Raven as he proceeded to struggle to get Beast Boy off of his back. Beast Boy made it very difficult for this task to be achieved as he proceeded to continue digging his claws as deep as he could and even sinking his fangs into the demon's scaly hide for good measure.

Eventually, Abaddon managed to reach backward, grab Beast Boy by the mane, and throw him off of his back to his right. Fortunately, for Beast Boy, this direction happened to be towards a book shelf, and he positioned his legs and paws while hurtling through the air so that his paws touched the bookshelf, thus giving him the leverage needed to then propel himself right back at Abaddon.

Abaddon ducked, and the green lion landed on the floor right behind him, only to then turn into a horse and direct a powerful back kick at Abaddon. The demon straightened back up and turned his head to face Beast Boy just in time for the green horse's rock hard hind hooves to give him a pounding blow right to his jaw. The demon was sent flying backward by the force of the blow, and he landed hard in the exact same area he'd landed in after getting hit by Raven's summoned beam of holy light.

Abaddon got back up and looked towards Beast Boy in time to see him charging towards him in the form of an African elephant, trumpeting furiously. Thinking quickly, Abaddon waved his right hand, and the green elephant bellowed in surprise as it suddenly plummeted into a shadowy vortex that appeared underneath it from out of nowhere.

The instant the vortex closed after Beast Boy had entered it fully, Abaddon lunged up so high that he managed to get a firm foothold on the very center of the glass ceiling. With his left hand and both of his feet firmly gripping the ceiling, Abaddon snapped his fingers, causing a second shadowy vortex to open up in the air three yards beneath him and four times that distance above the floor. Beast Boy the elephant came rocketing upward from this vortex with a surprised trumpeting noise at the exact same time that Abaddon sent himself flying downward towards Beast Boy. And in the time it took for the vortex to close, Abaddon was able to position himself so that he had his right leg extended towards Beast Boy's back. As a result, the foot in question slammed into the elephant's back with a sickening crack, and the elephant was sent pounding down hard onto the floor right in the same area as the Brotherhood of Dante emblem engraving.

When the dust cleared, it revealed a sprawled out and in pain green elephant. It opened its eyes and let out a groaning bellow of pain before shrinking back into Beast Boy's human form. The shape shifter had just enough time to let out a second, and this time more human-like, groan of pain before he suddenly felt something hard that felt suspiciously like a clawed foot slam into his left side and send him rolling away to his right. He shrieked in agony as he felt his back slam into the hard wooden surface of the front desk as a result.

A crouching Abaddon seemed to appear in front of Beast Boy's face mere seconds after this, and the demon grinned at the young green teenager before saying, "You know what they always say about survival of the fittest. Now it's your turn to fall to the power of the natural order."

All of two seconds passed after this comment before Abaddon felt something plow into him from out of nowhere directly in front of him with an angry feminine yell. As he hurtled backwards towards a wall, Abaddon was just able to notice that Starfire now both had a firm grip on his shoulders and was pushing him backwards before he felt his back slam into the wall she was pushing him towards.

Abaddon had barely any time to get his bearings before Starfire's furious face came up to look directly at him, and her eyes glowed dangerously green. In a flash, Abaddon jerked his head to his left just in time to avoid getting his face fried by the laser blast that Starfire fired from her eyes. He then jerked his head to his right to avoid a second laser blast. Seconds after getting his head back into its original position, he growled at Starfire, and then abruptly gave her a powerful head butt attack.

The Tamaranean was sent staggering off balance, and she didn't even get the chance to regain firm footing before Abaddon sent a shadow energy orb the size of a bowling ball flying at her. The shadow orb slammed into Starfire's chest and exploded into shadowy smoke with a flash and bang, sending the Tamaranean princess flying backward with a shriek of pain and shock.

Starfire had just managed to get herself back on her hands and knees after this when she suddenly felt something grab her by the neck and yank her upward. She gasped at the sight of Abaddon's glaring face looking her in the eyes as well as his clawed hand clenched around her throat. Abaddon growled, and then stated coldly, "Even the brightest of stars eventually have to go out, and now it is time for your light to be extinguished!"

Ironically enough, immediately after Abaddon said this, he himself suddenly became seemingly enshrouded in light when he abruptly felt himself getting engulfed in electricity. He roared in pain as he was zapped mercilessly in the web of voltage, and he let go of Starfire, who wasted no time to fly as far away from Abaddon as she could. When the electricity web that Abaddon had become ensnared in faded away, the demon remembered how he'd felt something strike him on the back right before he'd gotten electrocuted, and then turned his head to look behind him. Sure enough, he saw none other than Robin standing a couple feet away.

Abaddon snarled, leaned forward towards Robin, and then pawed his left foot back and forth before rushing head-on towards Robin like a Minotaur. Robin remained where he was as Abaddon charged towards him, slightly tensed up as if at the ready to lunge suddenly to the side. Right as the demon was mere seconds away from plowing its horned head into Robin, the boy wonder abruptly somersaulted to his left and out of the way just in time. Abaddon skidded to a stop, jumped around 180 degrees to face Robin again, and proceeded to rush at him a second time. Robin repeated his earlier strategy, but this time to his right, and Abaddon again ended up running right past him without causing any damage.

Abaddon skidded to a stop, jumped a 180 degree angle turn to face Robin once again, and was just about to roar in rage at the boy wonder when he suddenly sensed two large objects heading towards him from either side. He just had time to take a closer look to notice two large bookshelves encased in shadowy energy flying through the air straight towards him. From the way they were positioned, it was clear that he was about to be sandwiched between them. Seconds later, the two bookshelves clashed together with a loud smack.

Raven held the bookshelves in position for at least three minutes before finally releasing them from her hold. The bookshelves fell down hard on their backs, revealing a seemingly empty space in the area where Abaddon had originally been standing. Frowning in suspicion, Raven levitated over to where Abaddon had been standing in order to get a closer look. However, right as she was on her hands and knees examining the area, she suddenly heard a voice from behind her and above saying, "Impressive, unless you were trying to hit me." Raven turned her head just in time to see Abaddon suddenly land on the floor right behind her and then throttle her in the face with a powerful right hook. Raven was sent hurtling upwards before she landed hard on her back.

Abaddon was just preparing himself to attack Raven again, when he suddenly heard the sound of energy blasts and noticed a sonic laser heading towards him from behind him at the exact same time as a salvo of star bolts hurtled towards him from the front. Snarling, Abaddon summoned a shadow force field around himself and the energy blasts harmlessly plowed into the walls of the dome-shaped dark barrier. Five seconds later, noticing a lull in the energy blast onslaught, Abaddon proceeded to lower his force field just in time to see the two titans who'd early been firing energy blasts at him hurtling towards him from their respective directions.

Unfortunately for them, Abaddon was ready, and he unleashed an ear-splitting dragon-like roar. Starfire and Cyborg discovered the hard way that this roar was ultra-sonic when they found themselves getting sent flying backward by the force of the noise waves. At the sight of the Tamaranean princess and partially robotic teenage boy sprawled out on their backs, Abaddon chuckled, and then mockingly stated, "Well that was certainly a roaring success."

Abaddon laughed at his wit, and then turned to face the area where he'd earlier left Robin and Raven lying around just in time to see Beast Boy barreling towards him in the form of a rhinoceros. Right as Beast Boy was inches away from plowing into Abaddon, the demon quickly grabbed onto him by his horn, lifted him upwards, and then slammed him down on the ground on the side opposite the demon.

Hissing in pleasure, Abaddon lifted the green rhinoceros up again. But this time, Beast Boy was ready, and he turned into a gorilla while in mid-air. No sooner had the transformation freed him from Abaddon's grip when he hurriedly grabbed onto Abaddon's bull-like horns in mid-air and positioned himself so that he landed on his feet on the floor, lifting Abaddon upwards in the air as a result of the momentum.

With Abaddon thus incapacitated, Beast Boy the ape proceeded to slam him down on the floor left and right four times before then jumping up and slamming him down even harder than before. The impact from Beast Boy's fifth slam was enough for Abaddon to bounce on the floor three times before skidding to a stop on his belly. Abaddon got back up on his feet just in time to see Beast Boy charging towards him as a grizzly bear, bellowing out a harsh roar of challenge.

Unfortunately, luck was once again not on Beast Boy's side, for Abaddon then proceeded to send a jet of shadow-fire from his palms that crashed into the green bear and sent it rocketing backward. Beast Boy crashed into a wall and crumpled to the floor, groaning in pain.

Abaddon chuckled, and was preparing himself to lunge at Beast Boy when he heard Cyborg yell, "Hey Abby! Try this on for size!"

Abaddon turned his head in the direction he'd heard Cyborg shout just in time to see that the teenage half-robot had uprooted the emblem engraving from the floor and was now swinging it towards him. The solid gold circular engraving slammed into Abaddon with a tremendous bang, sending the knight of Hell flying towards the wall that Starfire had originally been lying down near. Abaddon crashed into the wall, managing to get his bearings just in time to see that Cyborg had now jumped into the air and was now hurtling down towards him with his right fist drawn back as if to punch at him.

Growling, Abaddon thrusted his own right fist forward in a right hook of his own. His fist pounded into Cyborg's chest with such force that Cyborg could have sworn that Abaddon had managed to break the sound barrier before Cyborg himself was then sent rocketing backwards and up through the air before landing hard back on the floor quite a few yards away from Abaddon. The demon snarled when he saw Cyborg slowly get up, and he yelled, "How about you try _this_ on for size," before snapping his fingers. In a flash, Abaddon's own shadow suddenly detached from him, rose up, and then contorted and writhed as it proceeded to take the shape of what looked like a serpentine creature with a dragon's head and four octopus-like tentacles at the base of its body. The entire creature was made out of shadowy energy. No sooner had the creature fully formed when it reared its head back and then abruptly thrusted it in Cyborg's direction, unleashing a savage roar of challenge as it did so. Cyborg just had time to gulp at the sight of Abaddon's shadow monster construct before the creature suddenly slithered towards him at a speed that made it seem like quicksilver.

Abaddon just had enough time to smile snidely at the sight of the creature snap Cyborg up in its jaws before he suddenly found himself having to leap to his left to avoid getting caught in the sudden barrage of explosive fire disks, star bolts, and shadow bombs that came his way alongside a volley of books being chucked at him by Beast Boy in the form of a chimpanzee. Upon reaching a perch at a safe distance away, Abaddon suddenly appeared to blink out of existence and then reappear up on the very center of the ceiling. The titans barely had a chance to notice that before he then started rapidly teleporting again and again, reappearing in random locations within seconds so as to confuse the titans and cause them to aimlessly strike and fire their attacks.

Fortunately, Robin was wise to this trick, and he yelled, "Titans! Back to back compass formation!"

In a flash, Robin leaped into a position that allowed him to face one of the walls, Beast Boy positioned himself back to back with Robin so that he was facing the wall opposite Robin, Raven positioned herself so that she had her back up to the sides of the two boys and was facing the remains of the computer, and Starfire positioned herself with her back up the two boys and facing the doors to the library. Thus positioned, the four titans watched as Abaddon continued to teleport randomly around them while seeming to gradually move closer towards them without giving any hint as to which of them he'd attempt to strike at first. Robin's eyes narrowed, and he said, "Be ready to strike out at any moment." His three companions nodded, tensing themselves so that they'd be ready to attack if necessary.

A couple minutes later, Abaddon suddenly appeared in front of Beast Boy. Unfortunately for the demon, the shape shifter was prepared, and a powerful kick that came from him in the form of a kangaroo sent Abaddon hurtling backward. No sooner had Abaddon been knocked off balance when the four titans proceeded to hit him with everything they had. Robin showed no mercy in his tossing fire and electricity disks at Abaddon, Raven unleashed a storm of shadow orbs, Starfire sent a meteor shower load of star bolts, and Beast Boy unleashed a blinding assault of blows as a kangaroo, giant anteater, and rhinoceros in rapid succession. Over time, this assault was enough to get Abaddon positioned so that he a titan rushing towards him from all four sides. Unfortunately, right as the four teenage heroes were about two feet away from him each, he summoned a ring of shadow orbs around that he then caused to explode right when the titans were an inch in front of them. This fantastic ring of shadow orb explosions blew the four titans away.

Abaddon laughed, grinned snidely at the teenage heroes, and said, "Give up Titans! You can't win!"

Beast Boy got himself on his hands and knees, growled, and then turned into a Utahraptor before rushing towards the demon, snarling viciously. Abaddon chuckled, positioned his hands so that they were a foot or so above the ground, and sent what looked like streams of shadowy smoke pouring onto the floor, which seemingly proceeded to absorb them. When a flat circle of shadowy energy suddenly appeared on the floor centimeters away from Beast Boy's feet, the changeling had just enough time to skid to a stop, snarl in shock, and then turn into an ostrich and run away before the shadowy energy abruptly erupted upward in a fantastic spout of shadowy energy. And even worse, as Beast Boy continued to run, more shadowy spouts proceeded to form on the ground and erupt from there, continuously following Beast Boy's every movement like a heat seeker.

As Abaddon was thus focusing on Beast Boy, he suddenly heard Cyborg yell, "Take this!"

Surprised, Abaddon turned his head just in time to see that not only had Cyborg managed to somehow fight off the shadowy monster he'd been tangling with, but had also sent a large volley of missiles flying towards him. Cursing under his breath, Abaddon summoned a shield, and all the missiles hammered into it harmlessly. With the last of the missiles gone, Abaddon lowered his shield in time to see Cyborg bearing down on him with his fist drawn back. With a sweep of his tail, Abaddon knocked Cyborg's legs out from under him. Cyborg had been lying down on his back for three seconds after this before Abaddon grabbed onto him and proceeded to lift him up so that he was holding Cyborg up in the air directly above him.

Having thus positioned Cyborg like this, Abaddon snarled, and then yelled, "Tenebreo Caelum!" A gigantic bolt of shadowy lightning plunged down on Cyborg exactly one second later.

Cyborg screamed in pain as he was painfully blasted by the shadowy energy blast. When the shadowy lightning bolt vanished, he panted and gasped, and also happened to notice that the blast had been strong enough to jolt his power level down from 90% to 77%. "So this is how enemies of the Marvel family feel," he thought to himself bitterly.

"Tenebreo Caelum!"

Cyborg let out a second pained groan as a second bolt of shadowy lightning speared him in the chest. When this bolt of shadow lightning faded away, Cyborg had just enough time to notice that his power level had now been blasted down to 54% before he then heard Abaddon yell for a third time, "Tenebreo Caelum!"

The agonized howl that Cyborg unleashed upon getting struck by this third shadowy lightning bolt would have deafened a banshee. Seconds after this bolt faded away, Cyborg heard a computer-like voice in his mind say, "Warning, power level 26%."

Abaddon growled, and yelled, "Tenebreo . . . !"

However, this was as far as the demon got before he abruptly got hit in the back by a pair of vivid green laser beams. This sent him stumbling forward and caused him to lose his grip on Cyborg. Abaddon had just managed to turn his head to glare at Starfire before he was then forced to dodge another pair of her eye beams. Before long, he found himself having to deploy a force field around himself as he ended up under fire from both Starfire's eye beams and star bolts and Raven's shadowy blasts. After a few minutes of this, Abaddon caused his force field to explode outward in a rippling shockwave of shadow energy that slammed into the two girls and sent them flying. No sooner had Abaddon blasted the two girl titans out of the air when he snarled, and turned his head to face directly in front of him just in time to see Robin directly in front of him with his sword at the ready. Seconds later, before Abaddon even had a chance to blink, Robin thrusted his sword through the demon's chest.

Abaddon howled in pain, and crumpled onto his hands and knees, his skin becoming engulfed in weakly crackling black lightning. Unfortunately, much to Robin's shock, it soon turned out a minute later that while the sword was indeed causing Abaddon pain, it wasn't apparently enough to kill him. As if to further support this, Abaddon soon reached up, grabbed onto the hilt, and then pulled the sword out of his chest. As Robin and the other Titans gaped at Abaddon in shock, the Knight of Hell proceeded to point the sword at Robin with a look of half irritation and half grudging respect on his face and then hiss, "Well played boy wonder. Well played."

Abaddon tossed the sword over his shoulder, and it slid underneath the emblem engraving lying down on the floor where Cyborg had dropped it after earlier smacking Abaddon with it. Abaddon then pointed his finger at Robin and said, "But you'll need more than a simple demon-killing weapon to slay a knight of Hell! And while we're at it, how about I show you an ace I have up _my_ sleeve!"

The instant Abaddon said this, he snapped his fingers and an elephant-sized orb of shadow energy appeared in the air directly above his head. A second snap of the demon's fingers caused the orb to explode into at least fifty or so rhino-sized shadow orbs that began to fly erratically around the room in random directions.

"Run!" Robin yelled, and he and the other titans promptly began to run off towards a large group of toppled bookshelves just as the multiple shadow orbs began to slam down randomly on the ground like meteors. It was only by sheer luck that all five of the teenage heroes managed to successfully jump up behind the bookshelf barricade and reach safety without getting caught in any of the blasts resulting from the onslaught of shadow meteors.

"You can't hide from me forever!" Abaddon roared. "Sooner or later, you will come back out of hiding, and I will send you on your way to the realm of the dead if it's the last thing I do!"

Robin growled silently as he heard this, and then looked at the other Titans before saying, "I hate to say this, but he has a point. At this rate, we'll be dead before we're even a fraction away from overwhelming him, not to mention my sword is both apparently not strong enough to kill him and is currently unavailable. Any ideas?"

"We could try to exorcise him," Cyborg suggested. He and the other Titans looked to Raven.

"Well," said Raven. "From what I remember it saying in the database before Abaddon blasted it, knights of Hell are just as vulnerable to exorcisms as any other demon. However, it also says that Abaddon has, to date, never been successfully exorcized before. Granted, it doesn't say he's immune, but it does say that no one who's ever tried to exorcise him as ever to date survived against him long enough to finish it. As a result, the Brotherhood of Dante has come to nickname him the Unexorcisable."

Robin growled, rammed his right fist into his left hand, and then said, "Well we'll just have to see how long he still remains worthy of that nickname when we're done with him." He positioned his head to face all four of his team mates, and then said, "Alright titans, you all know that Raven is our exorcist here, so we need to make sure that Abaddon doesn't have any chance at attacking her. Spread out and try to distract as best as you can so that Raven will have enough time to finish reading the exorcism! Got that?"

The other titans nodded their heads, and Robin smiled. "Good," he stated. "Titans go!" Robin, Starfire, Beast Boy, and Cyborg promptly jumped out from the hiding place and rushed towards Abaddon while Raven remained crouched behind the makeshift barricade. Within seconds, the four titans that had left the safety zone resumed their battling of Abaddon, making sure to hit him with everything they had and also to further keep him focused on them by goading and taunting him with insults to make him angry. And as they did this, Raven proceeded to summon her book of demonology that contained exorcisms and open it up to the one designed for higher ranking demons and knights of Hell.

Raven silently counted to ten in her mind, and then proceeded to read, "Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus . . ."

Unfortunately, seconds later, the Titans' plan suddenly began to go downhill. Mere seconds after Raven began the exorcism and Abaddon felt the distinctive nausea that came to demons when they were being effected by an exorcism, he teleported away from Raven's fellow Titans, reappearing right in front of Raven just as she finished reading the first line of the exorcism.

Raven had just enough time to find herself gaping at Abaddon in shock before the demon swiped the book out of her hands, hurled it away towards the other four titans, and then grabbed her by the throat before lifting her up to his face level. As Raven gasped for air and the other titans found themselves paralyzed with horror as they stared, Abaddon snarled, and derisively hissed, "You dare attempt to exorcise me?!"

Raven panted and gasped in reply, as Abaddon's grip was far too tight for her to really say anything else. Abaddon growled, and then angrily roared, "Out of all the knights of Hell, I am the only one who has never once been exorcised! I have remained that way for the last few millennia, and I will most certainly not allow that record to be lost today, and especially not at the hands of a filthy half breed spawn from the union of a human and a _Trigonian_ demon!"

At this point, Robin was hurriedly flipping through the pages of Raven's discarded book, which had landed near his and Beast Boy's feet. As Beast Boy heard what Abaddon said, he groaned in exasperation, rolled his eyes, and swiped the book from Robin's hands. "Gimme that!" the shape shifter yelled as he grabbed onto several pages and yanked them over, revealing the same exorcism Raven had been reading before getting interrupted. Seconds later, right as Robin was about to indignantly yell at Beast Boy and Abaddon was on the verge of thrusting his claws through Raven's heart, Beast Boy extended his right hand towards Abaddon dramatically while holding the open book in his left hand before angrily yelling, "Spiritus, omnis satanica potestas!"

"What the!?" Abaddon yelled as he jerked his claws to a halt. "Who's reading that?" He stared in shock in the direction he'd heard the suddenly continuing exorcism in time to see Beast Boy still in the same position from mere seconds ago with a defiant snarl on his face.

Growling, Abaddon dropped Raven and started running off towards Beast Boy. However, right as the knight of Hell was halfway between Raven's position and Beast Boy's, Raven got back on her feet, her own left hand extended towards Abaddon much the same way Beast Boy's right hand was and yelled, "Omnis incursio infernalis adversarii!"

Abaddon shrieked in shock and pain, and spun himself around to face Raven, only to screech in shock and pain once more when he heard Beast Boy yell from behind him, "Omnis congregatio!"

And as Abaddon found himself ending up turning his head left and right rapidly in confusion as a result of the tag-team exorcism going on, Beast Boy and Raven worked together to finish the exorcism while Robin, Starfire, and Cyborg looked on in stunned awe.

"Et secta diabolica!" Raven shouted.

"Ergo, draco maledicte!" Beast Boy yelled.

"Ecclesiam tuam secura!" Raven howled.

"Tibi facias!" Beast Boy roared.

"Libertate servire!" Raven snarled.

At that moment, Abaddon finally made the snap decision to resume his hurried racing towards Beast Boy. Unfortunately for the demon, he'd made this decision too late; for in the time it took for him to take seven steps towards Beast Boy, the shape shifter managed to emphatically growl, "Te rogamus, audi nos!"

"NO!" Abaddon roared as his head involuntarily jerked back, his jaws snapped open, and a massive geyser of black smoke erupted from his mouth and into a shadowy vortex that suddenly appeared in the air directly above him. Minutes later, Abaddon himself crumpled into a mass of black smoke that conjoined with the stream that had erupted from his jaws and proceeded to get dragged along with it. And as the bottom end of the now combined spout of smoke rocketed higher up and closer towards the vortex, the very tip of it seemed to take on the shape of a dragon-like head that opened its jaws and let out what sounded like both a dragon-like roar and the word 'no' at the same time. The instant the last of the smoke that had Abaddon had now become entered the vortex, the vortex snapped shut and vanished.

For what seemed like an eternity, the Titans remained standing where they were. Robin, Starfire, and Cyborg looked completely dumbfounded and stunned while Raven and Beast Boy remained calmly standing where they were and gazing blankly at their three speechless friends. Cyborg, finally managing to get his voice back, stated, "Well, it seems that you two have just now exorcised the unexorcisable."

The sound of Cyborg speaking brought Robin's own voice back, and he said, "I daresay, good job," before looking at Beast Boy with a still rather surprised look on his face. "Beast Boy," he asked. "How did you do that?"

Beast Boy raised his eyebrow. "How did I do what?"

Robin gestured weakly at the area where Abaddon had been hovering over the floor while in the midst of suffering the effects of the finished exorcism. "That. How were you able to exorcise Abaddon alongside Raven? I thought Raven was the only one among us who had the power to exorcise demons."

Beast Boy made a silent 'oh,' and then looked at Raven, his eyes seeming to silently ask her what to do. Raven nodded her head up and down in a clear gesture of 'yes'. Beast Boy nodded, took a deep breath, and then said to Robin, "You know how Raven and I were the ones who went out to pick up our lunch for today?"

. . . . .

Hours earlier, Raven and Beast Boy were at the Titans' favorite pizza joint, waiting for the pizzas they'd ordered to go to finish so that they could take it back to the tower. As they were waiting at their usual table, Beast Boy found himself staring intently at Raven out of the corner of his eyes. From her outward appearance, it looked as if Raven were completely calm. Beast Boy, however, had a feeling that she had something on her mind that she wasn't all that keen on voicing at the moment. And the fact that he himself still had both the exorcism from that morning and the attack from the previous night on his mind only served to strengthen this belief that he shared with all the animals in his mind.

As he had the thought, Beast Boy found himself wondering something else that had been on his mind ever since Raven had finished the exorcism that morning. Before long, he abruptly stated, "Hey Raven? Can I ask you something?"

This statement momentarily caught Raven off guard. She managed to regain her composure a few seconds later, and she said, "Well you technically just did . . ." At the sight of Beast Boy hanging his head down and groaning, she swiftly recovered by stating, "But yes, you can go ahead and ask me something else."

The shape shifter exhaled in a mixture of relief and exasperation, looked Raven in the eyes, and asked, "I've been thinking about certain matters of religion, and I've over time found myself wondering, how is it that you are capable of exorcizing demons? I thought that power only came from the authority of God and Jesus."

Raven's eyebrows raised in surprise. She had not expected Beast Boy to be that knowledgeable about his religion in spite of his lapse in maintaining full loyalty to it. She thought to herself, and then stated truthfully, "Before I left Azarath and came to Earth five years ago, Azar thought that I should be able to defend myself appropriately if I were ever attacked by demons. And so, she used her own spiritual power to grant me the ability to exorcise demons."

Beast Boy raised his eyebrow in further confusion as if to ask Raven how it was possible for Azar to have that kind of authority, and the sorceress explained, "In the Azarathian culture, the authority to banish demons from the realm of the living back to Hell comes from both their equivalent of God, and the Azarathian angels. However, unlike in the religious cultures of Earth, the spiritual leaders of Azarath are capable of choosing a successor to share their power to exorcise, and in Azar's case, I was that chosen successor."

"Hmm," Beast Boy said. He then nodded, and asked, "Hypothetically, is it possible for Azarathian spiritual leaders like Azar to grant this power to multiple different people over the course of her life time? Or is it a onetime deal?"

"That depends," said Raven. "As Azar is a full-fledged religious leader in Azarath, she has the power to choose a second successor if her first successor chooses not to take the position in her place when her time to step down comes. However, such a situation in which a second successor has had to be chosen has rarely ever happened."

Beast Boy nodded, then seemed to take on an expression that made him look as if he were considering whether or not to ask Raven something else. A minute or two later, he seemed to come to a decision, and he said, "Hypothetically, as Azar's chosen successor, could you perhaps allow your exorcism powers to be shared with others the way she can?"

Raven thought to herself, feeling slightly confused as to why Beast Boy seemed so interested in this topic. Eventually, she decided that she might as well humor him, and she said, "Yes and no. I can indeed choose a person to share my exorcist powers with. However, unlike Azar, as I am not a full-fledged Azarathian spiritual leader, I can only do this with one person."

"Only one?" Beast Boy asked in a tone that sounded both surprised and awed.

Raven nodded in the affirmative.

Beast Boy whistled, and then said, "Wow, I guess that means you'll definitely have to make your decision count when you make it."

"Indeed," said Raven.

Beast Boy chuckled slightly, took a deep breath, and then said, "Well in that case, if it's ok with you, I'd like to be that person."

This comment caught Raven completely off guard, and she found herself gaping at Beast Boy with her eyes widened. After what seemed like an eternity, Raven finally managed to regain her voice, and she said, "You . . . want to be . . . my successor?"

Beast Boy nodded, his eyes closed in agreement.

Raven panted in surprise as she tried to think up a reasonable response. "Beast Boy," she stated. "Are you sure you want this? I can't share this power with anyone else if I give it to you, and this ability can be just as much of a burden as it can be a blessing. Are you absolutely positive you want it?"

"Yes Raven," he growled. "I do; and if you don't want to give it to me, then at least don't share it with Robin. All I ask is that you at least share it with someone other than Robin if you don't pick me."

At the sound of this, Raven found herself very surprised. "What do you mean?"

Beast Boy sighed, and then responded, "Look Raven, I get that we don't have very much in common, but I value you as a friend just as much as I'm sure you do for me and the others. But with me, I just don't think our friendship is nearly as strong as it is between you and any of the others. I mean come on, you and Cyborg get to have your time together to work on the T-Car, you and Starfire meditate together, and of course you also have that _oh so special_ Vulcan mind meld mental link between you and Robin."

Raven's eyes widened at the slight bitter tone that Beast Boy had when he brought up her and Robin's strong mental bond, but before she could say anything, Beast Boy said, "Maybe I'm not being entirely as selfless as I could be in asking you to share your exorcism abilities with me, but I just want something that we can share between us the way you have something of that nature between Robin, Star, and Cy."

At the sound of this Raven gulped, hung her head, and responded, "Wow, I never realized you felt that way, but we already share the knowledge of what it's like to have a broken heart, and the knowledge of what it's like to struggle with a literal inner monster, and also what it's like to have abnormal skin coloring."

"I know that Raven, but I want more than that!"

Raven reared back in shock.

Beast Boy winced at the sight of this, and he hurriedly said, "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to explode like that." He sighed, hanging his head, and then lifted it back up before saying, "Look Raven, what I'm trying to say is that I want something for us to share between only the two of us that is both corporeal and entirely beneficial. And also, I want to be able to easily protect you from those demons like I wish I could have when I saw you in the midst of you battle against that Luciferian thunder demon last night."

The changeling directed a more serious look at Raven, and then said, "Don't try to deny it Raven. I saw how your battle against that particular demon was going last night before you managed to be lucky enough to get a lucky break, and I can tell that if circumstances had unfolded in a more unfavorable way, then you could have died against that demon."

Raven's eyebrows rose in shock, but she hastily recovered and then said, "I don't know what you're talking about Beast Boy."

Beast Boy sighed, hung his head, and then lifted it up with his eyes closed. "Raven, you may be capable of lying to Cyborg, it's a given that you can lie to Star, maybe it's possible in spite of your mental link with him to lie to Robin, and maybe you are somehow even capable of lying to yourself."

He sighed again, opened his eyes, and then growled in a mixture of exasperation and desperation, "But you can't lie to me!"

Beast Boy stood up, pointed at Raven, and said, "I saw how tired and weakened you were becoming during your battle with that thunder demon even while I was in the midst of trying to keep myself alive while fighting the fire demon, and both me and my animal instincts could tell without even needing to hear you say it that you could have very easily been killed by that thing. And do not deny it, I mean it! We both know that it's true!"

Raven opened her mouth, then thought to herself, and then nodded in the affirmative.

Beast Boy sighed in relief, nodded his own head up and down, and then said, "Watching you like that, and not being able to do anything. You don't know how guilty and self hateful I felt for seeing you like and being unable to help you. I was so tired and weakened by that point myself that not even the Beast was able to intervene in time.

"And also, with the demons we exorcized this morning almost certainly spreading the word down in Hell, it probably won't be too long before it becomes common knowledge that you're capable of exorcizing them. With that in mind, the next time we ever encounter any, odds are high that you'll very possibly be among the first of us to be targeted by them. And I don't want you to have to suffer that burden alone."

Beast Boy took a deep breath, exhaled, and then continued, "And finally, I know that this might make me look supremely selfish, but I want you to share your exorcism powers with either me or at least any other person apart from Robin." He looked at Raven and continued, "I don't know why but, ever since our experiences with your father, I've found myself feeling just so . . . well . . . jealous of Robin in regard to you. I mean, I know that I really shouldn't but, ever since we defeated Trigon, I found myself making notes of all the things he's done for you during that time and before then, and how strong your friendship with him is, and I've found myself unable to help but feel as if I'm perpetually overshadowed by him no matter what I do for you."

The changeling turned his head to gaze at the tower, and with a slightly bitter tone reentering his voice, he explained, "I mean, I took a more or less free tour of your inner mindscape alongside Cyborg, yet Robin's the one with a practically permanent telepathic mental link with you. I'm the one who knew exactly how you felt after Malchior broke your heart, yet Robin's the one you freed from the effects of the time stopping spell while I had to remain frozen in mid-morph and on the bench while he fought alongside you against Slade. I'm the one who shares your knowledge of what it's like to struggle with a living inner darkness that's making every effort to claw its way out, yet he's the one who stepped up the plate and attempted to talk you out of becoming the portal. And don't get me started on how he was the one who accompanied Slade to search for you. It's almost been a full year since then and the Beast still won't let me hear the end of it."

Beast Boy sighed, turned his head to face Raven with a surprisingly weary and depressed look on his face, and said, "Look Raven, I get it that I'm probably making myself look like a selfish jerk by saying all this, but it's just that, after all he's done to make me feel second best, and especially since he already has that sword that grants him the power to protect us against demons by killing them, I want to be more or less on equal footing with him in regard to protection against demons through sharing your ability to exorcise them. I know it's a lot to ask, but for the sake of our friendship and what we already do have between us, please at least grant me this wish."

Raven was rendered speechless, yet also slightly proud and admiring, by Beast Boy's heartfelt speech. Gulping, she hung her head, thought to herself, and then took one more look at Beast Boy's depressed and weary face before immediately making her decision. She lifted up her right hand, gestured for Beast Boy to straighten himself up, and when Beast Boy did so, she placed her right hand on the top of his head before closing her eyes, concentrating, and then saying with her eyes opened and completely white, "By the authority placed upon me by Azar, I bestow upon you the power to banish demons from the realm of the living and back to Hell."

No sooner had Raven said this, when her hand glowed with a blinding white light that spread onto Beast Boy to the point that he himself was engulfed in an aura of the same brilliant light. After a few minutes, and with a small flash of light, Beast Boy was revealed to still be slightly glowing with light before the aura eventually faded away entirely, and Raven's eyes took on their normal color.

After a few minutes of silence, Raven said, "How do you feel?"

Beast Boy thought to himself, and then smiled before responding, "Surprisingly, I actually feel pretty good, not to mention strangely warm and powerful inside for some reason."

Raven nodded. "That's good to hear." She then looked back towards the doors leading from the pizzeria rooftop patio to the interior of the restaurant, lifted her hand off of Beast Boy's head, and said, "Come on, let's go see if the pizza's ready. With luck, the next time we encounter and exorcise any demons, you'll be able to put your potential new powers to good use."

. . . . .

Hours later, at the library of the local Brotherhood of Dante headquarters, Raven and Beast Boy told the other titans about that incident. However, for the sake of diplomacy and preserving Robin's feelings, they omitted the matter of Beast Boy's lingering jealousy and feelings of being second best towards Robin. In spite of this though, Robin had a feeling that there was something that his two chromatically challenged friends had left out. But in light of how he and the other Titans had already gone through enough that day in his opinion, he chose mercifully to not push the issue any further. Instead, he nodded in acceptance of what Raven and Beast Boy had talked about in regard to Beast Boy's now having exorcist powers, and said to Raven, "Well I can definitely say that you made a good choice Raven. I honestly think that Beast Boy was an excellent choice for you to share those abilities with."

Beast Boy's widened in shock when he heard this. He hastily recovered before Robin could see it. The action, however, did not go unnoticed to Cyborg, who raised his human eyebrow inquisitively.

The titans were then brought back down to Earth when they heard an electronic voice say, "Threat neutralized. Emergency lockdown deactivating." Seconds later, they heard the sound of the heavy barrier on the other side of the doors rising up, and then they both heard and saw the doors to the library open.

Upon sight of this, Robin addressed all four of his teammates, "Come on team, let's go find Master Novak and the other senior members. I have a feeling that they probably have backup copies of their database on a flash drive or two. And if so, I have a feeling we're going to need to borrow one so that we can continue our research at the tower. I'm thinking that with the computer in this library destroyed, and with Savage having gone so far as to send a knight of Hell after us, we're going to need to work double time tomorrow to try to figure out a logical theory about what it is Savage is trying to find out for the sake of Lucifer's plot."

With that decision having been made, the titans promptly left the library to go find the Brotherhood of Dante members, only pausing long enough for Robin to retrieve his sword from where Abaddon had tossed it away. They now knew that it would definitely be worthwhile to continue their efforts that they'd begun that day at the Brotherhood of Dante headquarters. However, not one of them noticed a single purple demon fly above the glass roof and away from the headquarters to head off in the direction leading to the coastal forest located to the south of Jump City.

**And just like that, another chapter has been completed! ^_^ I hope you guys all enjoyed it and that you leave lots of reviews! I especially hope you enjoyed the fight scene! I really enjoyed writing this one, and I feel very proud of how it turned out. I especially hope you guys enjoyed all the BBRae stuff I included in having them double team Abaddon with the exorcism and having that little flashback conversation.**

**On another note, here are a few comments I wish to make to TheForceIsStrongWithThisOne. In light of what you said to me in a PM a while back regarding the previous chapter, I'm really sorry that this chapter has proven so long. Hopefully, this one will at least be more exciting to you than the previous one. On another note, since I'm sure you might potentially have some things to say to me in regard to my portrayal of Abaddon, let's just say that for the sake of this story and take on the DC universe, he is an umbrakinetic. Also, my thing about him (at least until this recent battle of his) being considered unexorcisable is based on how his counterpart in Supernatural (which happens to be a female, believe it or not) is entirely immune to exorcisms. The thing about Robin's sword not killing him is also based on how his counterpart in Supernatural proved immune to being killed by (but still at least feeling extreme pain from) a special knife that serves the same purpose in that universe as Robin's sword in this story. Finally, I also hope you find my explanation of how Raven is capable of exorcising demons (not to mention my immediate explanation for Beast Boy suddenly being able to do the same) is acceptable for you. Nonetheless, I hope you enjoy this chapter ^_^.**

**Coming up next: Vandal Savage finds out about his latest failure in assassinating the Teen Titans, which later leads to him and Slade cutting ties as well as to the immortal intelligent cave man having a discussion with Lucifer that leads to a change of plans in regard to finding what he needs to help the latest plot of the devil come to fruition. Meanwhile, the very next day, the Titans continue their research at the tower with help from a handy flash drive provided to them by the Brotherhood of Dante and manage to make a major breakthrough in the process.**


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